Nursing and Informatics for the 21st Century: An ... - Nice Computing

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Awards and Honors:
Robyn L. Carr, Green Lane, Auckland,
NZ, was elected to the position of Chair
of Nursing Informatics IMIA-NI, a special
interest group of the International
Medical Informatics Association.
Mary D. Doyle, Tucson, AZ, was honored
at Tucson Nurses Week
Foundation’s 2006 Fabulous 50, recognizing
the top 50 Tucson nurses at a
conference and gala dinner and dance.
More information about the Foundation
is available at http://www.tucsonnursesweekfoundation.org
.
Angela Barron McBride, Lafayette, IN,
was selected as a Living Legend in the
American Academy of Nursing. She
has been a Fellow since 1980 and will
be honored at the 33rd Annual Meeting
& Conference in Miami in November.
Karen S. Martin, Omaha,
NE, was honored with
the Distinguished
Achievement in Nursing
Award from The
University of Iowa
College of Nursing for
her significant contributions
to the field of
Karen S. Martin
nursing (from a
6/29/2006 University of Iowa News
Release). Martin is the author of more
than 80 articles, chapters, and books
including The Omaha System: A Key to
Practice, Documentation, and
Information Management, as well as 70
editorials. She is also the co-developer of
the Omaha System web site (www.omahasystem.org)
and serves on numerous
editorial boards and review panels.
Judith A. Murphy, West Allis, WI, was
selected as a Fellow in HIMSS, July 2006
and can now use the designation FHIMSS
after her name. She is also running for the
Boards of HIMSS and AMIA and is Chair
for the 2007 AMIA Spring Congress.
Presentations:
Martha Dewey Bergren, DNS, RN,
Chicago, IL, testified September 15th
before the National Committee of Vital
and Health Statistics (NCVHS)
Subcommittee on Privacy and
Confidentiality hearing on Privacy
Protections for Medical Records of
Non-Covered Entities. NCVHS is the
continued on page 5
NI2006 – International Congress on Nursing Informatics
Conference Report
By Peter J. Murray
About 75 CARING members attended and actively participated in NI2006, the
Ninth International Congress on Nursing Informatics, which took place from
June 9 - 14 at the COEX Convention Centre in Seoul, Korea. NI2006 was
organised by the Nursing Informatics Specialist Group of the Korean Society for
Medical Informatics (KOSMI), in conjunction with and on behalf of the
International Medical Informatics Association – Nursing Informatics (IMIA-NI),
IMIA’s Special Interest Group in Nursing Informatics.
The theme of the conference
was “Consumer-centred,
computer-supported care for
healthy people”, and many of the
keynote speakers addressed
aspects of the theme, producing
challenges for the future of
nursing and informatics. Roy
Simpson (Cerner Corporation),
addressed the need to redefine
nursing in an increasingly
Photo courtesy of Peter Murray
“consumer smart” world, and
warned of the dangers of nurses
becoming an endangered species
if they did not evolve, while
Roy Simpson and Hyeoun-Ae Park
Thomas Wong (Hong Kong
Polytechnic University) explored
the development of home-based telehealth applications and individual health
profiling.
In her opening keynote address, which accompanied a lavish display by Korean
dancers and musicians, Dr. Unna Huh, President of the Information and
Communications University, Korea outlined some of the technological
developments within Korea that are underpinning the capacity to support hightech
healthcare delivery. From her talk, new buzzwords and terms – ubiquitous
computing and u-health (as a move on from e-health) – seem to have captured the
imagination of colleagues. Ubiquitous computing refers to the concept of
computing devices being everywhere (“anywhere, anytime, on any device”), often
unseen or not recognisably “computers”, with interaction supported by high-speed
wireless networks. For new health services (u-health) this includes remote
wireless monitoring, wearable/implantable devices, and services to seamlessly and
invisibly support telehealth.
With over 340 presentations, including tutorials, panels, workshops and
demonstrations, and with more than 150 paper presentations, and almost 140
posters, addressing a wide diversity of subjects, it was only possible for any
individual to physically attend a small proportion of the event. A conference blog,
with photographs and some associated podcasts, provides further personal
perspectives on many of the conference presentations and activities, and allows
for a flavour of some of the presentations that people may not have been able to
attend. (http://differance-engine.net/ni2006blog)
The event was extremely successful, with over 700 participants from 34
countries, and high numbers of attendees from Japan,
continued on page 5
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