The University of Montpellier has been selected for the France 2030 program with its “
” project to establish the School of Digital Health “ESNbyUM”
The winning projects from the first round of the “Skills and Careers of the Future” Call for Expressions of Interest in Digital Health will be presented at the event “Innovating Together in Digital Health,” dedicated to major ongoing and upcoming initiatives in digital health innovation, to be held on November 21, 2022, in Lyon, in the presence of the Minister of Higher Education and Research, Sylvie Retailleau; the Minister of Health and Prevention, François Braun, the Secretary General for Investment, Bruno Bonnell, and Saila Rinne, Head of Sector – EU Policies, European Commission, Unit H3 “eHealth, Well-Being and Ageing.” Along with ESNbyUM, the University of Montpellier is one of the nine winners, thereby confirming its leadership in Digital Health.
The government has decided to provide €4,043,200 in funding for the ESNbyUM project over a five-year period and to entrust its management to the National Research Agency. The Occitanie Region, which invests heavily in higher education and research, is supporting the project with €600,000 to contribute specifically to the creation of educational resources and the deployment of new digital tools. These financial commitments will supplement the resources provided by the partners who have formed a consortium. Finally, the project has received approximately fifty letters of support. The project leader is Professor Maurice Hayot (University of Montpellier and Montpellier University Hospital), supported by a multidisciplinary team of experts in the field.
ESNbyUM, an innovative model for a school of excellence in digital health—interdisciplinary, interprofessional, and open to the worlds of healthcare, research, and business.
Recognizing that healthcare professionals still lack sufficient training in the challenges and practices of digital health—even as demand and usage are skyrocketing—a Call for Expressions of Interest entitled “Skills and Jobs of the Future” was launched to support the emergence of talent and accelerate the adaptation of training programs to meet skill needs, new fields of study, and the jobs of the future.
The University of Montpellier is a pioneer in the field of digital health, having offered innovative programs in this area for over a decade: the Master’s in “ICT for Health” and “Science and Digital Technology for Health”; the University Diplomas in “ICT and Health” and the “National University Diploma in Telemedicine”; “University Diploma in e-Health: The Digital Transformation of Pharmacies and the Pharmaceutical Industry.” It possesses extensive expertise in the fields of health, medical devices (MD), regulatory affairs for health products, law, and the management of health information systems (IS)—disciplines central to the AMI’s objectives. Building on this experience and recognizing that this is a major challenge for our nation, the University of Montpellier, by bringing together the strengths of its academic departments, schools, and institutes in this field, has decided to respond comprehensively and ambitiously to the five actions outlined in this Call for Proposals, which focuses on training in digital health:
- Healthcare and social services professionals: Action 1
- Digital specialists with a background in healthcare: Action 2
- Management and senior executives of healthcare and medical-social facilities: Action 3
- Lawyers with expertise in digital health: Action 4
- Roles responsible for regulatory affairs and compliance assessment in digital health: Action 5
ESNbyUM’s four objectives:
It is a new, off-campus school whose goal is to:
- To train more than 20,000 students, healthcare professionals, social workers, and specialists involved in digital health over the next five years
- Provide training for emerging careers in the healthcare sector (Health Data Scientist, Clinical Transformation Specialist/Consultant, e-Health Cloud Engineer, Clinical Application Trainer, Healthcare Cybersecurity Expert, etc.)
- Offer innovative and distinctive teaching methods based on digital and mobile flipped classroom tools, including the creation of a simple, immersive, interactive, and flexible digital campus with spaces specifically designed to enhance the user’s sense of immersion
- Make the University of Montpellier’s School of Digital Health visible and accessible throughout the region
With strong support from the Occitanie Region, ESNbyUM will serve as the foundation for the region’s Center of Excellence in Digital Health, working in synergy with all stakeholders in the field, including academia, healthcare and medical-social institutions, businesses, and local governments. It also aims to become a unique French model of precision education designed to train students in new skills and prepare them for emerging careers, thereby addressing the major challenges—both current and future—of digital health.
In the Montpellier area, the project partners—organized as a consortium—include healthcare institutions (Montpellier University Hospital and Nîmes University Hospital, ICM), training and support organizations (GCS IFSI-LR, KORIAN Academy, KEEPF, FORMATICSanté, IMT Mines Alès, ISIS Castres), the company ONAOS, the GIP e-Santé Occitanie, and the Pfizer Innovation France Endowment Fund.
The list of supporters is available here.