The integration of informatics, social networking, biobanking/biotechnology and clinical medicine is poised to deliver new translational targets for diagnostic and therapeutic questions in clinical medicine. Clinical medicine and research have steadily separated themselves over the past few decades.

Creating a novel model to harvest community-based clinical practice and harness it for translational research purposes bring clinical practice and research closer together in a practical manner, enabling rethinking of poorly defined diseases and refocusing clinicians on better defined outcomes for any disease - a grand step towards better personalized medicine.

Building a collaborative network involving community clinicians, hospitals, academics, and industry partners is key to the success of this model. Impact of this network to date in practice settings and collaborative environments will be discussed as well as future directions

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The case for open source healthcare information systems: An overview of healthcare information system licencing and a look to the future.

Healthcare information systems have the potential to bring improvements in patient safety, quality of patient care and efficiency. The sale of health care information systems is an emerging multibillion pound industry and as policy makers, health care professionals and patients, we have a responsibility to maximise the return on investment. Alternative licensing and software development models, the role of standards and the role of communities are analysed and it is argued that open source licensing is needed to promote safer, more effective health care information systems.

Presentation will be given by Dr Carl Reynolds at the International Digital Laboratory, University of Warwick, England. It will take place on August 24th August at 4pm. Dr. Reynolds is a physician, health informatician and clinical advisor with an interest in change management enabled by health care IT. Read More »