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Commemoration ceremony for November 11, 1918, at the Montpellier Nîmes Faculty of Medicine
The Dean of the Montpellier-Nimes Faculty of Medicine has been elected President of the Conference of Deans of Faculties of Medicine.
The Mozart Awards for success, which recognize commitment and boldness, have just been presented.
During an evening event bringing together economic decision-makers from Occitanie, awards were presented to regional figures for their initiatives.
The year 2023 honors the dean of our faculty, Professor Isabelle Laffont, by awarding her the health prize.
Please find attached the article from Midi Libre dated November 24, 2023, and links to various articles explaining how the evening unfolded:
and videos: econews, Agence Go Easy
We are very happy for her and proud that the faculty is so well represented!
Every five years, a new dean's team, composed of vice-deans and project managers, is appointed by the Dean to represent him or her in specific tasks. This year, Professor Arnaud Bourdin was appointed Vice-Dean in charge of relations with the Clinical Research and Innovation Delegations (DRCI) of the Montpellier and Nîmes University Hospitals. Read his interview here to find out more about his career and the projects he hopes to implement as part of his mission!
You were appointed by Dean Isabelle Laffont. Can you tell us about your background and your area of expertise?
Pulmonology is an extremely broad discipline, covering fields as diverse as vascular medicine, inflammation, oncology, allergy, immunology, aerology, and more traditionally, environmental science, infectious diseases, intensive care, addiction medicine, and a good deal of technical expertise. It inspires culture, knowledge, and open-mindedness. It is by far the organ most in contact with the environment. It is a difficult organ to explore. You have to be in touch with it, with a desire to understand, reason, and generate evidence in order to grasp this multiplicity of themes. It is also a discipline that inspires humility, with all that this entails in terms of responsibility and ethics in order to progress.
How do you plan to balance your duties as vice dean with your other professional obligations?
As President of the DRCI and the CRBSP, I have been committed for many years to instilling a scientific culture in our faculty. Knowledge is often there, within reach, and not all issues can be resolved by recipes that are impossible to teach. The issue is therefore not one of reconciling activities, but of promoting this vision as much as possible in all the activities of the Faculty of Medicine.
What will your contributions and objectives be? What projects do you want to carry out in your role?
The first objective is, of course, educational: research is omnipresent in health curricula, from the validation of knowledge to the awarding of various degrees to the missions of teacher-researchers. Charters of responsibility, ethics, and respect for patients are deeply rooted in the human and social teachings of the past, and the Montpellier-Nîmes Faculty has a duty to be a pioneer in this field. The second is to instill a culture of research in the Faculty, through its commitments, but also through its human and intellectual heritage. In conjunction with the scientific council, the orientation of major structural projects, the identification of needs, and the analysis of successes as well as failures must help us to progress collectively.
What motivated you to accept this appointment?
Training through research, a taste for progress, a rejection of mediocrity and the "idiopathic," and a desire to always provide better care and support, which requires rigorous and ambitious educational and scientific policies, are the drivers of motivation. Today, this is an urgent challenge for our Faculty and, more broadly, for our university hospitals, to ensure not only their legitimacy and sustainability, but also, and above all, their excellence.
Every five years, a new dean's team, composed of vice-deans and project managers, is appointed by the Dean to represent him or her in specific tasks. This year, Professor Stephan Matecki was elected president of the Scientific Council. Read his interview here to find out more about his career and the projects he hopes to implement as part of his role!
You have been elected Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board. Could you tell us about your background and your area of expertise?
I am a physiologist, head of the Pediatric Functional Exploration Unit and a research team within the UMR CNRS 9214-INSERM U1046 Unit located at the IURC. I am also co-head of the Master's program in Biology and Health. After studying medicine in Paris, I completed my internship and residency in physiology in Montpellier. I have always been deeply committed to scientific training and supporting our students in their scientific careers. This has enabled me to develop a comprehensive support program for our youngest students by setting up a dual health sciences curriculum designed for all health students. This program was recently certified by INSERM and has been integrated into the national network of Medicine-Science programs at its school. As a member of the Scientific Council, I have also been able to develop this support strategy through a system of early and regular mentoring for all our candidates for university hospital careers, who will be the future of our faculty.
How do you plan to balance your professional activities with those of Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board?
When you love what you do, you don't count the hours. But as a physiologist, my professional obligations are less demanding than those of a clinician or surgeon. What's more, I think that my activities as head of the Master's program in Health Biology and as head of a research team are very complementary to my role on the scientific council. A role which, I should point out, is very much focused on mentoring and providing supportive guidance to our young people who are keen to pursue a career in university hospitals.
What will your contributions and objectives be? What projects do you want to carry out in your role?
I would like to focus on promoting the visibility of our Montpellier-Nîmes Faculty of Medicine in terms of its scientific policy, in line with the Montpellier and Nîmes University Hospitals, by highlighting its core business, which is training in the field of health, and its driving force, our students. I would also like to step up our support for young candidates through scientific advice, based on a relationship of kindness and mentoring. The aim will be to train them to reflect on their scientific positioning, which will guide them in their future scientific careers. Support for candidates must be put in place as early as possible, which will enable us to better advise and guide them so that they can approach the interview with confidence, as their scientific background and positioning will have been validated in advance. Finally, I would like to continue developing dual health and medicine programs, adapting them to the growing demand, especially since the introduction of the student pathway assessment, which will be taken into account in the matching process.
What motivated you to accept this appointment?
Above all, it is a pleasure to give our youngest members all the help they deserve. Their enthusiasm and attentiveness are a real driving force for me, almost like a fountain of youth.
Every five years, a new dean's team, composed of vice-deans and project managers, is appointed by the Dean to represent him or her in specific tasks. This year, Professor Maurice Hayot was appointed Project Manager for Digital Health and Innovation in Digital Education.
Read his interview here to find out more about his career and the projects he hopes to implement as part of his role!
You have been appointed "Digital Health and Digital Education Innovation Officer" by Dean Prof. Isabelle Laffont. Can you tell us about your background and your area of expertise?
I am a physician, a physiologist by academic discipline, and a pulmonologist by medical specialty. I am also head of the Clinical Physiology Department at Montpellier University Hospital, which comprises three medical teams specializing in functional, respiratory, metabolic, and pediatric testing.
The main tasks of physiologists are clinical exploration and research into the body's major functions, as well as personalized patient care, particularly through rehabilitation. Digital tools have enriched our practice in recent years.
In the field of digital health, I have contributed over the past ten years to creating and co-directing several training courses within the framework of "ICT and Health Montpellier" ("ICT" stands for "information and communication technologies"), including:
- the Master's degree in "ICT for Health," which has evolved into "Science and Digital Technology for Health,"
- the national Telemedicine DIU bringing together seven universities in France.
How do you plan to balance your duties as a project manager with your other professional obligations?
The field of digital health has become a key focus of my activities, and it is only natural that I will continue to pursue it in this role. I will act as a liaison between the various stakeholders atthe University of Montpellier and its partners involved in digital health, and our faculty, students, and teachers.
What will your contributions and objectives be? What projects do you want to carry out in your role?
The current challenge is to provide all healthcare and medico-social professionals with a foundation of digital health skills covering various aspects that will affect them in their daily professional practice:
- health data, cybersecurity in healthcare,
- telehealth (telemedicine and telecare),
- e-health and digital tools,
- methods of communication between patients and caregivers or between caregivers themselves.
Other professions outside the healthcare sector must also be trained; a master's degree seems to be the most appropriate level for initial training, but a strong emphasis must be placed on continuing education or apprenticeships.
I intend to carry out my mission by creating a strong dynamic within our faculty and atthe University of Montpellier, drawing on the considerable expertise we have gathered in the various departments. The flagship project is therefore to create the "University of Montpellier School of Digital Health" with actively involved partners.
What motivated you to accept this appointment?
This issue, which may seem new to some, has always been strongly supported by the presidency ofthe University of Montpellier, as well as by successive deans over the past decade.
Dean Laffont has long been an attentive and encouraging listener in this area, even before she took up her current position. Working together as a team to innovate in education is a powerful driving force!
