Welcome to ehealthpedia.org, Our Health Informatics Wiki

From ehealthpedia - Our Health Informatics Wiki

Health informatics is the subject concerned with the application of information and communications technologies (ICT) to the acquisition, processing, interpreting, storage, transmission and retrieval of health-related and healthcare data, and using the derived information and knowledge in healthcare delivery, education, management and research; in Europe and America the subject is becoming widely accepted and is expected to revolutionise medical and health practice, becoming a major component in clinical decision making, in patient care and public health.

Some definitions of health informatics and curriculum purpose statements from various institutions.

Medical informatics is the scientific field that deals with the storage, retrieval, sharing, and optimal use of biomedical information, data, and knowledge for problem solving and decision making. It touches on all basic and applied fields in biomedical science and is closely tied to modern information technologies, notably in the areas of computing and communication. — Columbia

Medical Informatics (MI) is the study of information processing as it is used in healthcare. It might have been called medical computing, but the French-derived term informatique is more commonly used internationally and probably conveys a broader set of concerns, including the uses and flows of Health informatics is the application of information technology in medical practice, research and education.information that may have little to do with computers. Like many engineering fields, MI has scientific aspects that focus on the description, modeling and interpretation of how information is actually generated, disseminated and used, and underlying constraints or natural laws that govern these activities. MI is also deeply concerned with design of appropriate medical information processing systems, with tradeoffs in their implementation, and with ways to evaluate their effectiveness.

Some have suggested health informatics as a better, broader term, meant to encompass aspects of health care that are not traditionally the focus of medicine, such as preventive care, nutrition, patient education, epidemiology, etc. Related terms include bioinformatics, which is the study of information processing in biological sciences. Opinion currently varies on whether bioinformatics is part of medical informatics, or-if it forms a distinct discipline—how it relates. Most expect that progress in understanding the molecular basis of disease will bring these fields closer together, if not to merger. Telemedicine (or the recent European coinage telematique) focuses on one aspect of MI, access to and use of medical information at a distance.

At MIT, in line with our traditions of institutional flexibility, we have no official organization that does medical informatics, but a number of small foci around the research and teaching interests of faculty in different Departments and Laboratories. —MIT

The Health Informatics Curriculum consists of course work that integrates the development of knowledge and understanding of the health care environment with knowledge and skills in management of health care information resources. — University of Alabama

The graduate program in Health Informatics trains students in the application of computer and information sciences to the quantitative aspects and decision needs of the health and life sciences. Health Informatics encompasses not only mathematics, statistics and computing, but also includes other engineering, management, and information sciences applied to problems arising in biology, medicine and the delivery of health care. —University of Minnesota

This program is designed to produce managers and administrators who can help organizations use information to improve the delivery of health care. Course work combines classes in computer science, health informatics and health management. As a result, students develop technical and management skills that will allow them to serve as an operational link between technology experts and clinicians. The core curriculum includes courses in health information and health-care systems; information storage, retrieval and management; and research methods and outcomes analysis. Students also complete an informatics internship that combines an intensive three-month field experience with the development of an applied research project. —University of Missouri, Columbia

Medical information science (MIS)encompasses data, information, and knowledge acquisition, representation, modeling, integration, communication, and interpretation ranging across basic science and engineering through clinical practice and policy. The primary mission of the MISProgram is to train biomedical informatics researchers for academia and industry. The Program's focus is on the scienceof biomedical informatics, with special emphasis on rigorous methodology, innovation, and generalizability of findings, rather than the routine application of technology tobiomedical science and practice. Training spans the full spectrum of biomedical informatics - from bench to bedsideto health system and from bioinformatics to radiologic imaging to decision science. Graduates of the Program willbe well positioned to contribute at the interface of bio- and medical informatics, where future research opportunities are excellent. —University of California, SF

Health Informatics is the discipline concerned with the systematic processing of data in the health care environment with an emphasis on computer processing. A more elaborate definition of Health Informatics as suggested by Haux is the following:

Health Informatics is concerned with the study of the principles of information processing and with the provision of (general) solutions for information processing problems in the field of health care; uses appropriate (formal) methods and tools, especially from informatics, to model structure and mechanism information processing systems in the field of health care in order to describe or analyze these systems or in order to provide possibilities for their construction or for their evaluation. —Universiteit Maastricht

Biomedical Informatics is an emerging discipline that has been defined as the study, invention, and implementation of structures and algorithms to improve communication, understanding and management of medical information. The end objective of biomedical informatics is the coalescing of data, knowledge, and the tools necessary to apply that data and knowledge in the decision-making process, at the time and place that a decision needs to be made. The focus on the structures and algorithms necessary to manipulate the information separates Biomedical Informatics from other medical disciplines where information content is the focus. — Vanderbilt

[Medical Informatics is] the field of information science concerned with the analysis and dissemination of medical data through the application of computers to various aspects of health care and medicine. —Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) — National Library of Medicine

The terms 'medical informatics' and 'health informatics' have been variously defined, but can be best understood as meaning the understanding, skills and tools that enable the sharing and use of information to deliver healthcare and promote health. 'Health informatics' is now tending to replace the previously commoner term 'medical informatics', reflecting a widespread concern to define an informationagenda for health services which recognises the role of citizens as agents in theirown care, as well as the major information-handling roles of the non-medical healthcare professions.... — British Medical Informatics Society

What is health informatics?

Health informatics encompasses the capturing, processing and modelling of health-related information. It is the integration of computer science, information science, networking and communication with the aim of improving health.

Researchers in the field of health informatics study the effectiveness of health information systems - both to compare various systems and to improve existing systems. They also investigate to how effectively health information is communicated to end users - whether the messages are understood, and have the desired effect.

Every time someone accesses health care in South Africa, information systems play an important role. Information about each patient has to be captured correctly and should be regularly updated to ensure that patients receive the correct treatment at the right time, and that their progress is monitored.

In South Africa today, health information systems at most levels of our health system are increasingly becoming computer based. Although this is greatly increasing South Africa’s capacity to deliver health services, there are some systems that are not functioning as they should.

These inefficient or faulty systems hamper the effective management of our health system and can eventually pose a threat to the health of our nation. In addition, they are implemented using large sums of money, underlining the importance of ensuring that they work and achieve the objectives for which they have been designed. -South African MRC

Sources:

• 138.40.95.27 06:44, 13 February 2007 (CST)Abdul Roudsari,City University.
• South African Medical Research Council