News from EHTO and the National Languages Affiliated Sites (NLAS)

With deepest regret, EHTO(*) announces that Prof. Jean-Louis Scherrer has passed away, after a short period of illness.
He was the founder of HON, and since its launching Prof. Scherrer has been the President of the “Health On the Net Foundation -HON”.
From the 60’s on, Jean-Raoul has started an endless battle throughout Europe and the World, assuming like an helmsman the revolt against conformity and the lack of knowledge and ambition, that existed sometimes in Health Informatic’s work progress; and, most of the time, he was always available to fight against that through encouraging the international medical community to invest in the essential knowledge, exchanging experiences with others, and to develop, and produce intelligent and effective solutions to be used by the institutional health actors dealing with informatics.
Along more than 30 active years, Prof. Scherrer has received a number of international important prizes, and honours, being also often invited as a key speaker at the main sessions of international congresses and in other important occasions.
In order to complement and to regulate the works in “Informatics in Health”, Professor Scherrer also gave a quality contribution (and has managed as well) to the creation of professional’s international institutions like as, EFMI, IMIA, and other internationally well known similar organisations and working groups (e.g. CEN).
Prof. Scherrer was a man possessing an excellent humanism, and that together with an extraordinary culture covering worldwide. He also had the gift of a fine-tuned intuition, acting like a kind of a permanent "added-value" to his professional expertise and knowledge. Prof. Scherrer has enthusiastically deployed all those capacities whenever professionals looking for the state of the art, rigour, and innovation for their projects, requested to him a specific support or help.
Jean-Raoul’s brilliance as a speaker was naturally glued to an involuntary capacity of persuasion of the audiences. All them were attracted also by Jean-Raoul’s personal charm and intellectual elegance, by his kindness, and of course, on the top of that, by the capacity of “vision” Jean-Raoul put in all types of interventions he has made.
Such rare and multiple characteristics of his personality, have profoundly touched thousands of us, who had the privilege to listen to Jean-Raoul in a number of conferences, congress’s opening speeches, or even in more societal occasions like the unforgettable gala-diners particularly when he played the role of host.
Finally, the nature of his friendship leaves an irreplaceable void place, in the heart, and in the memories of a large number of us.
Professor Jean-Raoul Scherrer will remain forever a remarkable and unique personality in his (and our) time.

(His Family address is as follows: 7, Chemin des Champs-de-Chaux, 1222, Vésenaz, Switzerland)
(*) EHTO takes part in the HON Council Board

	2008 Geneva Forum: Toward Global Access to Health 25-28 May 2008 Geneva International Conference Centre Geneva Switzerland Visit the Conference Site
	Collaboration of the Health On the Net Foundation (HON) with the French National Authority for Health (HAS) HON: the official accrediting body for all French health websites . Since its beginning 12 years ago, the Health On the Net Foundation (HON) has come to be a widely recognized name, associated with quality online health information. Not only has HON grown in terms of implementation of its services, but also has increased its liaisons worldwide to include the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations (UN), where it has consultative status to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC). Today, we are proud to announce our collaboration with the French National Authority for Health (Haute Autorité de Santé - HAS), which chose HON to be the official certifying body of all French health websites. In view of its pioneering work and long expertise, the HON Foundation has been chosen by the HAS to implement the certification of French health websites according to the French bill passed on the 13 August 2004. This certification will be performed by HON through the implementation of the HONcode (a set of eight quality criteria established by HON). "Our certification (provided free of charge) is concise while giving guidance towards conformity and is unique in its kind" said HON Executive Director Celia Boyer. She added "The HONcode enables the identification of sites of quality and confidence, thus contributing towards the general improvement of trustworthy information and Web sites, as well as helping the user in his search for health information." France is the first government to have taken the initiative of standardizing the quality of the available online health information which will benefit the French public through the provision of a pool of trustworthy health information. "The collaboration between HON and HAS reinforces the need for reliable and trustworthy health information and thus, the necessity for quality standardizing bodies like the HON foundation" stated HON President, Professor Antoine Geissbühler. More information: The Haute Autorité de santé (HAS ) - or French National Authority for Health - was set up by the French government in August 2004 in order to bring together under a single roof, a number of activities designed to improve the quality of patient care and to guarantee equity within the healthcare system. HAS activities are diverse. They range from assessment of drugs, medical devices, and procedures to publication of guidelines to accreditation of healthcare organisations and certification of doctors.
	5th Conference HealthGrid 2007 in Geneva 24-27 Apr 2007 University Hospital of Geneva Geneva Switzerland
	5th Conference HealthGrid 2007 in Geneva 24-27 Apr 2007 University Hospital of Geneva Geneva Switzerland
	Stages of Change in Smokers and ex-Smokers The Health On the Net Foundation and the Institute of Preventive Medicine of the University of Geneva (Switzerland) collaborate on a smoking cessation program called "Stop-tabac.ch". They also conduct a study on stages of change in smokers and ex-smokers. If you are a smoker or an ex-smoker, please take a few minutes to answer our questionnaire on http://www.hon.ch/QuitSmoking/scales.html Your participation will help us improve our smoking cessation programs. The HON Team



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Collaboration of the Health On the Net Foundation (HON) with the French National Authority for Health (HAS)