The Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Annual Conference and Exhibition has established itself as a great opportunity to share ideas and innovations that seek to optimize the healthcare environment.
The 25th edition of the event, held between the 23rd and 27th of February, made Orlando a cathedral of technological solutions for healthcare. In fact, HIMSS14 attracted more than 37,000 professionals, clinicians, executives and suppliers in the e-Health sector.
Mobility, self-management and interoperability were the trending topics at the Orange County Convention Center in Florida, USA.
Here, E-Health Reporter Latin America presents some of the stand out news from the latest edition of the HIMSS event:
Mobility
A piece of software that has been attracting a lot of attention was created by ActualMeds, a medical information technology company that focuses on providing web-based and mobile solutions for administration of medications to high-risk patients. Patricia Meisner, CEO of the company, said: “We provide cloud-based software for medication administration that connects buyers, suppliers and patients to the best history of the medication. It also includes orders and the Electronic Health Record together the patient’s self-medication information.”
In terms of mobile management, AirWatch Enterprise, which is dedicated to providing systems for secure exchange of patients’ clinical data, presented a solution that ensures the compatibility, efficiency and productivity of mobile applications. “With m-Health, healthcare is goingfar beyond the hospital. It could improve the efficiency of care and help patients to get back home more quickly,” said Paul McRae, Director of Health Business Development at AirWatch.
Interoperability and Hospital Administration
Cerner decided to have its clients recount their experiences with the company’s products in person. Island Health, the Hospital Marina Salud de Denia and Hospital Albert Einstein from Brazil were some of the guests that passed by stand 6965 to share how things have changed at their healthcare centers. Marcos Garcia, Vice-President for Global Strategy at Cerner, said: “We have the opportunity of working with world leaders in Health IT to improve effectiveness, reduce costs and increase standards of care.”
According to the SAP representative, over one hundred professionals in the sector visited the multinational’s booth to find out about the Medical Insights Project, which seeks to take full advantage of the SAP HANA platform.
For the first time at HIMSS, Phillips presented two of the products it has developed in Brazil: Tasy (EHR) and Multimedia (RIS). “The market in Mexico is the first objective of the company’s expansion while other countries in LatAm will receive solutions by the end of 2014,” said SolangePlebani, General Manager of Informatics Solutions and Services at Phillips Latin America.
With an emphasis on next-generation healthcare technology, CSC‘s focus at HIMSS 2014 was helping healthcare organizations address the Triple Aim of healthcare reform: better outcomes for patients; better health for populations; and lower per-capita cost. Particularly significant was HarmoniX, an integrated care management solution, providing practitioners with a patient-centred view across disparate systems.
Mario Chao, a Director at Everis, the creator of ehCOS CLINIC, came to the event with a team of company representatives. The new version of ehCOS offers numerous technological and functional improvements compared to the 2013 version, with new modules for Dentistry and Patient Safety. “This kind of event helps visitors to provide feedback on sector innovations across the world, to form relationships and debate the issues with other professionals from the sector (networking), and to gain new knowledge at hundreds of training sessions,” he said.
Images and Telemedicine
Agfa Healthcare made it clear that HIMSS14 was an experience at which one could learn more about how to administer IT implementation at a medical care center. Professionals from the company presented different exhibitions and showed that it is possible to monitor image data, manage the costs of image data IT, and contribute to the quality and efficiency of patient care.
Meanwhile, Accenture announced a new report on growth forecasts for electronic health records on the market. In addition, the company presented two technology initiatives: a new prototype for Google Glass and a telehealth platform that uses Xbox Kinect. “The Accenture projects help suppliers, health insurers and public healthcare bodies to satisfy their clinical, administrative and management needs in healthcare,” saidKavehSafavi, MD, JD,Global Director of Accenture Health.
A company making a big investment in the industry is Fujfilm Medical Systems, a provider of solutions that contribute to the synchronization of information. According to Jim Morgan, Vice-President of Medical Informatics at the company, radiologists and cardiologists interested in visualization and advanced analysis of images will find the innovations of Synapse 3D very attractive for their diagnostics needs, as it provides twenty-nine different functions to choose from.
Accusoft presented its kit of medical development software; ImageGear (SDK), which easily creates image visualization, editing and processing functions for care applications. Jack Berlin, the company president, said: “We had people at HIMSS14 to learn more about the emerging healthcare technologies of our clients, colleagues and competitors and also to show our new solutions for healthcare information technology to the market. Accusoft has a long and successful history in Health IT. Our imaging software, for example, is incorporated in medical imaging devices used across the world.”
