Hello everybody,

I am working as a public health physician in the regional public health
department for the Laurentian area, north of Montreal.  I am involved in
quite a few quite diverse public health activities - a situation I
suppose to quite common in non-urban public health departments where
there are few ressources. On an ongoing basis I am involved in
two main areas.

The first area are environmental health impact assessments. I am working
on all regional environmental impact assessments while doing some
research on this topic at the same time.  My research topic is focussed
on developing the environmental assessment framework in public health in
order to move from typical health protection aspects to health
promotion.  When applied to projects, environmental assessments can be
used to work towards healthy and sustainable environments through both
the use of rational impact assessment models and health promotion
processes like empowerment.  When applied to programs, plans and
policies, environmental assessments can be used as a tool for healthy
public policies.

The second area of activities is focused on public health ethics.  I am
involved in a research group of the Fonds de recherche de sante du Quebec
working on a research framework in the area of public health research as
well as public health actions like health promotion programs.

If anybody in this group is interested in these areas I would like to
establish contacts off-line.

My main interest and experience in using the Internet for my work in
public health is centered on establishing professional contacts and
exchanging information.  Use of the Internet as a means of public
education and advocacy is certainly very promising, but I cannot yet
contribute any experiences on this topic.

Reading the personal introductions of everyone, I was wondering about the
possibilities to store all this information in a WWW site so that one can
go back to these valuable information when needed.

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Reiner Banken M.D.
Medecin-conseil en sante publique
Direction regionale de la sante publique des Laurentides
185, rue Durand
Saint-Jerome (Quebec)
Canada J7Z 2V4

Tel: (514) 436-5669, # 273
Fax: (514) 436-1761
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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