Mark My Words

Between the 19th and 20th November 2008 I attended the HIMSS “Virtual Conference & Expo” where I also contributed to livetweeting using hashtag #himssvirtual. You can keep up-to-date with their latest news by following @HIMSS on Twitter. The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) is “the healthcare industry’s membership organization exclusively focused on providing global leadership for the optimal use of healthcare information technology (IT) and management systems for the betterment of healthcare”. The description of the event, taken from HIMSS, was:

“The HIMSS Virtual Conference & Expo is not a Web Seminar; it is a fully interactive event that incorporates online learning, live chat, active movement in and out of exhibit booths and sessions, vendor presentations, contests and more. Because the conference is 100 percent virtual, you can experience the expo from the comfort of your own desk. Save yourself the travel expenses and get right to the industry information and solutions you seek.”

A screenshot of the main virtual conference interface can be seen below:

The conference itself was split into four sections:

1. The Education Center hosted all of the live educational sessions which could then be reviewed later on in the day (and a further 30 days after the event) and offered interactive Q&A functionality during live feeds.
2. The Exhibit Hall hosted a virtual floor of vendor booths each with their own service representative chat facilities, resource downloads and presentations.
3. The Resource Center hosted hundreds of industry articles, white papers and resources available for download.
4. The Lounge provided additional networking facilities for attendees and vendor representatives in a more relaxed atmosphere. It also bought me some time to go grab a cup of tea and a biscuit between presentations!

I would have liked to have seen more emerging applications of IT and “Health 2.0”, as this is my research interest area, maybe we’ll see more next year? @healthythinker had an excellent presentation on “Smart Citizens, Smarter Patients: A Primer on Social Media and the Wisdom of Patients” which I thoroughly enjoyed (thanks again for the shout-out!). Overall I felt that the conference was a big success which was credit to all of the heard work put in by the @HIMSS team. I was also very glad that U.S. Central Time was GMT-6 hours and not GMT+6 hours, as a 3am start didn’t sound too promising. Hope to see you all next year!