Jeremías José Ramón Hernández Ojito

He was born in Güines, La Habana province, on June 17, 1938, as the result of the marriage of José Ramón Hernández and Pastora Ojito.

He received primary education at the public school "Francisco de Arango y Parreño" in his hometown, where he also completed preparatory studies to enter the Secondary Education Institute in the same locality, where he studied and completed his Bachelor's degree. During that time he was one of the leaders of the Institute's Student Association and, as such, developed multiple tasks of agitation and propaganda, worked with the Revolutionary Directorate in sabotage acts and distribution of revolutionary propaganda, as well as with the 26th of July Movement in the sale of bonds.

He participated in the acts celebrated in Central Park in Güines during the strike of April 9. Given his experience in surgery, in December 1958 he was contacted by the 26th of July Movement with a view to his incorporation into the guerrillas of the Órganos Mountain Range. While this coordination was taking place, the revolutionary triumph occurred on January 1st, 1959. That same year he enrolled in the School of Medicine at the University of La Habana.

When, as a result of the triumph of the Revolution, a massive exodus of professionals occurred and only 3,000 doctors remained in the entire country, he was one of the organizers of the great gathering on the university steps under the motto "With the homeland, against betrayal". He joined the Revolutionary National Militias from its founding and was responsible for War Medicine in the entire southern part of La Habana province; he completed the Militias School with the University Battalion at the "Caribe" camp in Boca de Jaruco. He was also an indoctrinator of the 26th of July Movement in Güines and, when the aggression at Playa Girón occurred in 1961, he took part in the neutralization of elements opposed to the revolutionary process in the Güines area.

During the October 1962 crisis he participated in the organization of a field hospital in Jaruco. On the other hand, he was present in many mobilizations for agricultural tasks on weekends and in the numerous sugarcane harvests of the people, in some for a period of 45 days, convened at that time by the country's leadership.

After completing his medical studies in 1965, whose graduation ceremony was celebrated at Pico Turquino with the Commander in Chief, he began working at Las Tunas hospital, the former province of Oriente, where he headed the Surgery service and, a year later, was appointed Director of the "Piti Fajardo" polyclinic in that city.

In 1967 he was appointed Director of the same hospital, a responsibility he fulfilled until 1969 when he moved to the "Vladimir Ilich Lenin" hospital in Holguín to conduct residency studies in Surgery. In 1970 he returned to Las Tunas hospital, this time as Subdirector; in 1972 he directed the institution's Union. During his time in that territory, he worked three months in the Regional CTC in the organizational process of the X Labor Congress.

In 1973 he was elected a member of the CTC Secretariat, first at the municipal level and then at the provincial level. During that time he also belonged to the army reserve of the Division of that city, in which he was Chief of Company of Medical Services and, in 1980, was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant. In 1974 he was one of the members of the surgery team that participated in the famous separation of the Siamese twins at the "Vladimir Ilich Lenin" hospital.

In 1975 he participated in the May 1st tribune in Las Tunas, Santiago de Cuba and La Habana and was invited to the Central Act for Health Worker Tribute Week in Pinar del Río. He was also proposed for obtaining the XX Anniversary Medal. That same year he traveled to the Soviet Union, Romania and Germany, as part of the incentives received for having been selected in 1974 as the most outstanding "basic worker" on a national scale.

In the 1977-1978 biennium he fulfilled an internationalist mission in Angola. Upon his return he worked as a surgeon at the "Mártires de las Tunas" hospital, where he remained until 1980 when he was appointed First Subdirector of the Clinical Surgical Hospital "Ernesto Guevara" in the same city. In June 1979 he joined the ranks of the glorious Communist Party of Cuba. In 1980 he was a delegate to the Provincial Balance Assembly of the Party in Las Tunas and was a member of the Council of Representatives and the Documentation Commission of the same.

In September 1982 he was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Medical Sciences in Las Tunas, a position he held until September 1989 when he was appointed Director of the National Center for Information on Medical Sciences. From his entry into the Party he was an activist in the Health Section of his Provincial Committee; in 1983 as an alternate member and in 1985 as a full member of that body until his transfer to La Habana four years later. During that time he was also a member of the Executive Committee of Popular Power Provincial in Las Tunas. Between 1992 and 2000 he was a member of the "Panel of Expert Advisors on Biomedical Information and Health" of the World Health Organization (WHO). He currently is part of the National Executive of the Committee of Doctors for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Dr. Hernández Ojito, Second Grade Specialist in Health Administration, holds the Main Teaching Category of "Consultant Professor" at the Higher Institute of Medical Sciences in La Habana and has received several recognitions and distinctions, among which stand out letters of commendation for work performed as an internationalist in Angola; the "Manuel Fajardo" Medal from the National Union of Health Workers, for more than 25 years of service in the sector; the "September 28" Distinction from the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution; the Internationalist Worker and Clandestine Struggle Fighter Medals from the Council of State; as well as the 30th Anniversary and 40th Anniversary Medals of the Revolutionary Armed Forces.

The National Center for Information on Medical Sciences directed by Dr. Hernández Ojito

When in September 1989 Dr. Hernández Ojito took charge of the direction of CNICM, he found, among other difficulties, the total absence of financial resources to acquire information sources as a result of the acute economic crisis affecting the country. Faced with this situation, he tried to develop referential information with a project supported by the Vice Ministry of Teaching of Minsap.

As part of that aspiration, an XT microcomputer was placed in each CPICM, to which external compact disc readers were added, as part of another project that had the collaboration of PAHO. Also, the main institutions in all provinces were provided with the MEDLINE and LILACS databases and some subscriptions to Current Contents were purchased, so that health professionals would have at least the possibility of keeping up with what was being published in the world, obtain summaries of works appearing in the databases and, through their own efforts, acquire copies of the originals of their interest, directly from the authors.

In 1992 an important step was taken when Infomed began to be developed, which made it possible to access electronically the National Library of Medicine of the United States and various important databases. Together with this, donations of books and journals were received from people and institutions from several countries, which served to increase the holdings of the fundamental units of SNICM.

In 1993 the journal Acimed emerged, as the organ of SNICM. This publication, unique of its kind in Spanish language, was conceived to disseminate production related to scientific-informational activity linked to medicine. Although in its early years it came out in a modest format, in its scant 40 pages one could see the intention to make it a unifying instrument of scientific communication and to contribute with its existence to the permanent dynamism demanded by current times of professionals dedicated to library-informational work within the world of health and disease.

During that period a system analysis was also carried out and a project for automation of the National Medical Library was designed; the information analysis group was created; new modalities of secondary documents were introduced and the production of databases was consolidated; trainings and updating and improvement courses were provided to SNICM technicians and professionals, as part of their development plan and the equipment for electronic composition of Medical Sciences Publishing House was modernized and expanded.

A group of talented young members of Infomed obtained the necessary training within and outside the country, until becoming an important nucleus in the development of the system, a matter that was quickly appreciated in countries of the Latin American region. This was demonstrated when Bireme specialists visited Cuba, and upon verifying this potential, they promoted collaboration projects such as the Virtual Health Library. This qualitative leap was expressed in the fact that from a simple electronic information network, Infomed became Cuba's telematics health network, in which epidemiological, statistical, economic and managerial information flows and important projects are developed such as the Virtual Health Library, the Virtual University of Health and telemedicine, among others.

When Minsap leadership decided to revitalize medical teaching literature, an objective compelled by the inauguration of the Latin American School of Medicine, CNICM assumed that task and Medical Sciences Publishing House took charge of the entire process of editing that bibliography. The National Medical Library gained much in organization, in equipment and in general conditions. Computer workstations were installed in it, offering users more possibilities for searching and retrieving the information they need. Within a logical process of evolution, commercial management related to journals and books was extended to scientific events held in hospitals, schools and polyclinics, as well as to scientific meetings of international rank held in Cuba, where sales are executed in national currency and hard currency and Cuban works and authors are promoted.

The opening of a medical bookstore at 23 and J in El Vedado was aimed at facilitating institutions and professionals to acquire medical literature from foreign and Cuban publishers and, at the same time, create a source of financing for the production of books and journals and other CNICM activities.