Isabelle LAFFONT, elected President of the Conference of Deans of Medical Schools

On March 4, 2025, the Conference of Deans of Medicine elected Prof. Isabelle Laffont as its new president and Prof. Marc Humbert as vice president.

Dean Isabelle Laffont thus became the first president of this conference.

The key points of their platform:

  • continue to promote the appeal of university hospital careers in order to revitalize the university hospital model;
  • to affirm the role of medical and health sciences schools in shaping and guiding biomedical research and innovation in health;
  • to continue and support lifelong educational development by consolidating the achievements of the reform of the second cycle of medical education, improving the reform of admission to health professions programs, and promoting well-considered educational innovation, continuing education, and research in education;
  • engage theUFRsin the regionalization of educational programs and research initiatives, in collaboration with all stakeholders. This regional focus of the medical and health sciences faculties is a key driver for transforming the healthcare system and addressing inequities in access to care;
  • to advance training in the health professions by integrating paramedical training into the university system;
  • combating student financial insecurity, promoting the prevention of psychosocial risks and gender-based and sexual violence, and fostering student well-being. These key issues must be given special attention, just as much as that given to students with disabilities.

Quick Bio: Isabelle Laffont

Isabelle Laffont studied medicine in Paris, where she served as an assistant chief resident (CCA) and then as a hospital physician at Raymond Poincaré Hospital in Garches (APHP).

In 2011, she became a professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PMR) at the Montpellier University Hospital and the University of Montpellier.

Elected dean of the Montpellier/Nîmes School of Medicine in 2021.

She has clinical expertise in the field of physical and rehabilitation medicine (PRM) as applied to neurological conditions, and has developed specific expertise in the areas of spasticity and neuro-orthopedics, as well as in new technologies applied to severe impairments and disabilities. She has established a regional network for care, education, and research in PRM throughout Eastern Occitanie.

She has been affiliated with the EUROMOV-Digital Health In Motion Laboratory since 2008 (University of Montpellier – Institut Mines Telecom). She conducts basic research on motor control to investigate the neurological mechanisms of neural plasticity that underlie recovery following central nervous system injury, with various clinical research areas, including technologies applied to rehabilitation. Among her teaching activities, she has been in charge of the Advanced Practice Nursing Diploma program since 2018, the REHAB track of the Master’s in Health program created in 2021, and the “Disability” module of the “Ethics, Disability, and Precarity” course unit in the third year of medical school.

In the academic sphere, she served as a member of the curriculum committee for the second cycle of medical studies, a member of the management council of the Faculty of Medicine, and a project manager for the academic integration of paramedical professions. In the hospital sector, she served as chair of the Territorial Cooperation and Networks Delegation at the Montpellier University Hospital and as a member of the DRCI. She has been a member of the CDD executive committee for two years, chair of the Monitoring Committee for the Reform of the Second Cycle of Medical Studies, and a member of the working group on the prevention of work-related stress and psychosocial risks since 2023.

She served as president of the French Society of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (SOFMER) from 2018 to 2021 and as secretary general of the International Society of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (ISPRM) from 2020 to 2024.

Quick Bio:Marc Humbert

Marc Humbert is dean of the Paris-Saclay Faculty of Medicine. He is a professor of pulmonology at Paris-Saclay University, where he serves as head of the Department of Pulmonology and Respiratory Intensive Care, the Pulmonary Hypertension Reference Center at Bicêtre Hospital (AP-HP). Marc Humbert directs the Inserm-University of Paris-Saclay Joint Research Unit UMR_S 999 (Pulmonary Hypertension: Pathophysiology and Therapeutic Innovation) and the Rare Respiratory Diseases Health Network (RespiFIL). He is vice-coordinator of the European Network for Rare Lung Diseases (ERN-LUNG).

He has served as Vice President for Research on the AP-HP Executive Board, President of the European Respiratory Society, and Editor-in-Chief of the *European Respiratory Journal*. Since 2018, he has been listed by Clarivate Analytics as one of the most influential scientists in the medical field. He has received numerous scientific honors, including the Descartes-Huygens Prize from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (2009) and the Eliane and Gérard Pauthier Prize for research on rare diseases (Rare Diseases Foundation under the auspices of the Fondation de France, 2016).

Sources: AEF news dispatch