What to Expect at e-health 2015

Shelagh Maloney, BSc, CPHIMS-CA, is Vice President, Communications, with Canada Health Infoway

One of the very last events of the 2014 e-Health Conference in Vancouver last year was a meeting of the 2015 Conference Steering Committee to start planning for this year’s conference. It’s hard to believe that the year has gone by so quickly and that e-Health 2015 is now just weeks away. Like anything that has been in the works for months, it’s exciting to watch the plans come together.

With your input, Canada Health Infoway along with the other conference co-hosts, CIHI and COACH, worked hard to bring you the strong education sessions and important network opportunities that you have come to expect from the eHealth conference. In addition, we’ve added a number of new components to the conference that will enhance your experience. New features I’m especially looking forward to include:

• Broader sector representation: The Canadian Home Care Association, the Canadian Foundation for Healthcare Improvement and the Canadian Patient Safety Institute will exhibit and attend this year’s conference. These groups understand the importance of technology in health care and their participation at eHealth 2015 will be a great opportunity for us to showcase our mutual efforts and discuss further collaboration.

• Young leaders as conference emcees: A number of emerging professionals submitted ‘audition’ videos detailing why they wanted to host eHealth for a day. I’m looking forward to seeing the winners strut their stuff on stage – these young leaders are our future; it’s important that we welcome and encourage them.

• Hacking Health: This event was a great success when it was introduced last year but we’ve brought it up a notch this year by kicking off the ‘hack’ at the end of March. Last year the teams had 48 hours to work on their pitch ideas – imagine the caliber of products we’ll see at Tuesday afternoon’s plenary when they’ve had eight weeks to work! Don’t miss this event. Closer to home, at the Infoway booth, we are taking the conference theme Making Connections, one step further. Our eHealth theme is ‘I Connect 4 #interoperability.’ Among other activities, we will be showcasing our new interoperability action plan and have some exciting information to share and activities planned for visitors to our booth so come by and say hello!

  

I look forward to seeing you soon!