From one year to the next, few sectors of the US economy change as much or as quickly as health IT. And at the 2013 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition, March 3-7, 2013, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, attendees will get a chance to see what that change looks like.
From one year to the next, few sectors of the US economy change as much or as quickly as health IT. And at the 2013 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition, March 3-7, 2013, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, attendees will get a chance to see what that change looks like.
From Meaningful Use to Interoperability to Mobile Health; all the big developments that are impacting the way healthcare works will be thoroughly explored in workshops, education sessions and on the HIMSS13 Exhibit Floor.
As Willa Fields, current chair of the HIMSS Board of Director, sees it, the thing to remember is that the major changes of the past year are “all interconnected.”
In her eyes, “perhaps the biggest change in health IT is the rise of patient engagement” as a focus for policymakers and providers alike. Previously, she said, healthcare providers were much more “disease oriented”, but now they’ve significantly expanded their perspective to put “connecting with the consumer” toward the top of their list of concerns.
And those consumers, she said, are already having an impact, especially when it comes to another of the past year’s major developments: mobile health. “There’s a whole lot of mobile health going on that’s being patient driven,” she said, pointing in particular to the rapidly multiplying array of mobile apps that “have nothing to do with providers.”
Of course, new technology is only the front end of the developments. The back end, so to speak, is the data that all those apps and devices are capturing. Given the importance of this newly available data, Fields said, HIMSS has created a Clinical & Business Intelligence Committee, which focuses on topics such as knowledge management to support accountable and quality care, informatics, analytics and data warehousing.
Another new conference offering Fields pointed to is the Meaningful Use Experience that will be part of the HIMSS13 Exhibit Floor. This special demonstration area is designed to expose attendees to complete EHR modules and solutions. An interactive event, the Meaningful Use Experience will enable attendees to meet vendors, see multiple demonstrations so that they can closely compare products, and hear a range of presentations.
According to Fields, attendees will experience more than just a random series of demonstrations, as exhibitors had a range of operational criteria they had to meet in order to be included in the exhibit.Meaningful Use, of course, is not the only system-wide transition with which healthcare stakeholders are grappling. ICD-10 is looming equally large on the horizon, and the full range of nuts and bolts of the ICD-10 transition will be the subject of a day-long symposium on Sunday, March 3, one of many that is kicking off the conference.
Fields said 30 different organizations contributed to the ICD-10 symposium, one of the products of which will be an ICD-10 playbook designed to guide stakeholders through the transition.
Themes All Around
If it seems that the HIMSS13 offerings are being presented thematically, that’s because they are. Looking back to the first HIMSS Annual Conference she ever attended, Fields remembered that “it was really overwhelming.”
To help attendees avoid that feeling, HIMSS has been promoting the conference with an eye toward helping visitors focus on the topic most important to them. The conference website, www.himssconference.org, has clearly designated categories for topics ranging from Health Reform to Meaningful Use to Health Information Exchange (HIE). Moreover, each issue of the conference newspaper, the Daily Insider, will take an in-depth look at one of those topics each day.
In addition, for the first time, the conference website has a specific “I am . . .” capability on the home page. From a drop down list, website visitors can choose the professional title that best describes their interests, and the website will bring up a list of all the conference sessions that are focused on that interest.
Finally, on both Sunday and Monday, HIMSS will be offering “1st Timers Orientation Sessions” where HIMSS officials will be on-hand to give an overview of the conference layout and schedule.
Featured Speaker: President Bill Clinton
As a nurse, Fields said, “I always look forward to what the nursing informatics committee has to offer.” This year, the committee will be taking an in-depth look at nursing informatics governance structures across the country.
Her specific professional interests notwithstanding, however, Fields said “the thing I am most excited about is former President Bill Clinton,” who will be delivering a keynote speech on Wednesday, March 6th.
“He’s obviously a world leader,” Fields said, and she noted specifically his influence on health issues around the world as a result of the work of his William J. Clinton foundation, which is focused on, among other things, improving global health and promoting healthier childhoods.
One thing that has not changed since Fields began attending is the fact that the HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition is “a fantastic way to learn what’s going on across the healthcare sector. There are lots of learning opportunities, with people at the top levels of health IT presenting valuable information. It’s also a phenomenal networking opportunity.”
Of course, attendees should remember that HIMSS13 is taking place in New Orleans, so it won’t be all work. This year, the Wednesday night special event is a Mardi Gras party, and you’re invited!
As Fields summed up the week, “there’s lots of educational stuff, and then there’s fun stuff, too.”
