Event Planning for 2012

At this eventful time of year, I thought I would hold off from sending a long post and instead focus on conference and event schedules. Don’t worry, the year-end review/look ahead post will be forthcoming after the 1st of the year.

There are so many good events to choose from, especially in the healthcare and health IT spaces, that it’s difficult to decide where to devote time-constrained resources. The Events page that we added to the Health Content Advisors site earlier this year lists all major events that I or my colleagues will be attending. At this point, only past 2011 events are listed, but we’ll update the list over the holiday period.

Somehow, I chose a fantastic mix of live events to attend last year and I hope to make a repeat appearance at all of these events in 2012. I’m making plans for #HIMSS12, February 20-24 in Las Vegas now and hope to add the SIIA IIS conference, January 24-25 in New York to the list for 2012.

When we update the Events page, we’ll add links to blog posts, pictures and videos from the events. As a preview, here’s a short video interview I did with HCPlive.com at the Health2.0 conference in San Francisco:

Also, please check out my previous post on Using Game Dynamics that includes a link to a video of my session at Data Content11 that focused on using game dynamics in market research and provides examples from healthcare research, including PatientsLikeMe.   

That’s it for now. Happy holidays and best wishes for a 2012 that exceeds your expectations!

Janice

Stay Tuned for Health 2.0 Coverage

This blog took a hiatus in August, but will be back in force for the remainder of September. I’ll be attending the annual Health 2.0 conference in San Francisco next week and look forward to some related events starting on Friday, September 23 (HealthCamp SF Bay), the Rock Health BootCamp on Saturday, and the pre-conference Patients 2.0 meeting on Sunday.

Health Content Advisors is a media sponsor of Health 2.0 this year, so watch for daily updates to this blog, along with my Twitter feed @janicemccallum that will post more frequent updates from the meetings.  Follow the conference hashtag #health2con for updates from the entire group of attendees.

On the topic of conferences, the InfoCommerce annual event, Data Content11, is coming up soon (November 2-4) in Philadelphia. As always, some healthcare companies will be represented on the program, but the focus is on the broader issue of how to build successful data publishing businesses. This year’s conference program theme is: Cloud, Crowd, and Curation.  Join us for B2B data publishing’s best networking event and to learn from our Models of Excellence companies how to create and sustain high value data businesses.

For those who want to know more about Data Content11, please contact me at jmccallum@infocommercegroup.com.  Or, drop me a line if you want to meet up in San Francisco.

HIMSS11 Conference Planning

I could spell out what HIMSS stands for, but if you have to ask, you probably aren’t planning to attend this major gathering for the healthcare industry.  HIMSS (okay, it stands for Health Information Management Systems Society) is a membership organization that was established 50 years ago for IT professionals working in healthcare, but has grown to include adjacent segments with interests in health IT.  The annual conference attracts close to 30,000 attendees (about 28,000 last year in Atlanta, but I expect a higher number in Orlando this year) and requires advanced planning to arrange meetings and optimize one’s route to minimize miles walked per day. 

Last year, I was pleased to see so many “traditional” healthcare publishers with a presence in the exhibit hall.  My blog post last March mentioned many of them.   This year, I expect to see even more publishers in the exhibit hall, on the program, and sitting in education sessions.  Better yet, I expect to see more progress in creating point-of-care clinical decision support tools and care management tools that build on the best-of-breed authoritative content and data sources. 

Forging alliances between the healthcare publishers and EMR/EHR/Health IT vendors is an important part of what we do at Health Content Advisors.  We’re not always the final dealmaker, but we get involved in identifying content and technology partners in nearly all of our client projects.  So, whether you are on the publishing side or the IT content integration or data exchange side, we’re interested in learning what is new among your offerings.  Please contact me @ jmccallum@infocommercegroup.com if you’d like to set up a meeting at HIMSS11.

On the “social” side, I’m looking forward to meeting up with the healthcare folks I interact with on a near daily basis on Twitter and via this blog.  It was terrific to connect with many so many of my social media contacts last year in Atlanta and I look forward to catching up with even more people this year-with better advanced planning-in Orlando.  HIMSS will have an expanded social media center in Exhibit Hall E, Booth 7981 , where I know I’ll see familiar faces.  I still remember getting a Twitter message from Liza Sisler @lizasisler who recognized me from my online photo when I sat in one of the social media sessions last year (“is that you across the aisle from me?”).   Also, I plan to attend the new media bloggers tweetup at the MEDecision booth #2563 on Tuesday, February 22 from 4:30-6pm. 

For more information on the HIMSS11 conference, see the conference home page.  Along with all the activities I mention above, there is also an impressive line-up of keynoters, including the who’s who of federal healthcare officials.  I look forward to seeing you there!