Professor Herman Schaalma died suddenly of a heart attack on 25 July 2009 while riding his road bike in the Limburg hills. Last Friday I joined a crowd of 400-500 people in Eijsden near Maastricht, the Netherlands, to say goodbye during an emotional, heart breaking, but sometimes also hilariously funny ceremony.
Herman was a social psychologist and health scientist working at the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience of Maastricht University in the field of planned development, implementation and evaluation of theory- and evidence-based health promotion programs, with a focus on HIV/Aids. His research focused on applying (social) psychology in understanding and changing health behaviors. His recent research interests included risk perception and communication; stigma; adherence; culture, psychology and health education; and web-based health education.
I worked with Herman during the time I was at Maastricht University and occasionally after I left Maastricht to work first in Rotterdam, and now at the EMGO Institute for Health and Care Research at the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam. In fact when in Maastricht I lived for a few years under the same roof as Herman; I lived in an apartment one floor above Herman and his family. Herman was a great colleague and a great neighbour.
The most intensive collaboration we had was when the two of us, together with Prof. Gerjo Kok edited the first edition of the Dutch handbook on health education and behaviour change. Working with Herman in this way was fun, rewarding and challenging. Fun because of his great sense of humour, rewarding because he certainly made sure that we got the job done and his input improved the book in a great way, and challenging because his razor sharp feedback and comments, no beating around the bush, made sure that you wanted to do your best before asking Herman to take a look at your output.
The field of planned, evidence-based health promotion has lost a great colleague and a great character.
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