Volume 2 - Issue 2 - March/April 2007

Industry Spotlight: HIMSS07 in Review

The 2007 HIMSS Annual Conference and Exhibition was held February 25th through March 1st in New Orleans. With approximately 25,000 attendees, a lineup of highly respected keynote speakers, loads of educational sessions, and a robust exhibitor list, this year's conference proved to be another great success. Many of you either attended the conference, or read the reviews in various publications. But, we were most interested in hearing what some of our readers thought about the conference. So, we asked some of our subscribers who attended HIMSS07 and below are their survey results.

What is your attendance history for HIMSS conferences?

16%	First-time attendee
84%	Have attended one or more times before

Which of the following best describes your presence at the conference?

68%	Attendee only
12%	Presenter / Speaker
4%	Vendor with Exhibit booth
16%	Vendor, but not Exhibitor

Please rate each of the following:

	Very good	Good	Neutral	Poor	Very poor
Training Sessions	28%	36%	32%	4%	0%
Guest Speakers	48%	36%	16%	0%	0%
Location	36%	48%	8%	4%	4%
Accommodations	44%	40%	16%	0%	0%
Attendees	44%	48%	8%	0%	0%
Networking Opportunities	52%	40%	8%	0%	0%
Conference Overall	48%	44%	8%	0%	0%

What was your PRIMARY purpose for attending the conference?

44%	Educational opportunities
44%	Networking opportunities
12%	Sales opportunities

Please rate the effectiveness of each of the following:

	Ineffective	Somewhat ineffective	Not sure	Somewhat effective	Effective
Keynote addresses	4%	8%	16%	32%	36%
Single speaker presentations	0%	8%	16%	40%	36%
Roundtable discussions	0%	4%	52%	20%	20%
Product demonstrations	0%	0%	16%	56%	24%
Training sessions	0%	8%	20%	40%	32%

What was the pace for the overall conference schedule?

72%	Well-paced. Could accomplish what I wanted to.
28%	Too fast paced. Could not participate in important events.
0%	Slow paced. Not enough content for the time allocated.

How well did the conference meet your expectations or goals?

24%	Exceeded my expectations or goals
76%	Met my expectations or goals
0%	Did not meet my expectations or goals

Attendee Comments:

Many of those who reponded also provided comments about what they believe is the most valuable aspect of the HIMSS07 conference. Here is what they had to say:

"Getting to see so many vendors in one place -- able to compare all vendors. Also, being able to see what is coming in the future."
- Anonymous

"The HIMSS07 conference provided us with the best in education, information and networking, all in a great location."
- Todd Babineau, President - CRH Consulting, Inc.

"The most valuable thing about HIMSS is the ability to meet with numerous vendors in a short time and to get a pulse for upcoming releases/new technologies."
- Anonymous

"HIMSS07 was a very positive experience. As a first time attendee, I was able to see the intersection of research, technology and healthcare on a grand scale. The speakers were impressive and the exhibit halls were on a huge scale. Overall, an excellent conference."
- Munish Khaneja, Chief Medical Officer - MediModules, Inc.

"One of the best aspects of the conference is the ability to mix and match various products and vendors at one place. I was able in a very short time to filter out products that do not need to be considered and those that do. In addition I was able to meet and know vendors and associtates that I only knew thru phone calls. The training sessions were of great value, mostly in the "don't try this" department."
- Darryl Hudson, Decision Support Mgr - Salinas Valley Memorial Healthcare System

"Ability to meet with vendors and obtain and share valuable information."
- Donald Jacobs, President - Inteck, Inc.

"Colin Powell ... very dynamic speaker ... talk transended healthcare."
- John D. Brown, CIO - Pacific Alliance Medical Center

"I spent most of my time in the vendor hall looking at products and that was well done again this year."
- Anonymous

"As mentioned above, primary goal was sales leads and I feel we accomplished the objective. A lot of interest in our EMR Interoperability product and services. Integrating physician practices, providing offices with result information and competing with the national labs was very much on people's minds. Our solution and business model really hit home for many sites."
- Michael Connors, VP, Business Development - Accenx Technologies, Inc.

"Overall, I think the conference was a hit. There seemed to be a lot more vendors this year and the products being demonstrated were very good and stimulated a lot of thought! The presenters were very good and stimulated a lot of ideas that I hadn't thought of to this point. Everyone did a great job this year."
- Roger Neal, AVP/CIO - Duncan Regional Hospital

"I was looking for specific software solutions for patient flow management ... what better place?"
- Anonymous

"Vendor exhibits."
- Anonymous

"Professional/business networking is the reason I attend HIMSS."
- Anonymous

"Demos from vendors, networking."
- Tammy Grygar, Independent Consultant

"I only attened the Nursing Symposium. It was excellent!!! I brought back many ideas for Scotland Memorial Hospital."
- Anonymous

Tricks of the Trade: Printing a New Page When Calling a Fragment (in CS)

Contributed by: Jim Prandi, NPR Report Writer, CRH Consulting, Inc.

Have you ever called a fragment and wanted to print a new page by location, patient, etc., but found that the fragment only prints a detail section? Well the reason for this is because of the New Page Program. When MEDITECH calls a fragment it does not change the New Page program to that of the fragment call. Here is how you can change the New Page Program in a fragment in Client Server.

Say you are in a PHA report and calling a Lab Fragment. Before you call the fragment, switch the New Page Program and when your report returns, switch it back. Below is what the code looks like.

The highlighted section reads:

^@Pgm.trans(%LAB.M.SPEC.zcus.mm.get.micro.results.RP)^@Z.rpt.new.page.pgm,
@CALL.REPORT,
^@Pgm.trans(%PHA.RX.zcus.mm.test.loc.RP)^@Z.rpt.new.page.pgm;

Note that in Client Server, you have to use the ^@Pgm.trans utility to get this to work, whereas in MAGIC, it’s more straightforward.

Jim Prandi is an NPR Report Writer for CRH Consulting, Inc. He has 10 years of experience with MEDITECH and his NPR expertise spans the gambit of clinical, financial and administrative applications on both Client Server and MAGIC platforms.

Recent News: Country Ponders NHIN Designs

There’s more than one way to build a nationwide health information exchange. The possibilities of varying approaches became clear at the Third Nationwide Health Information Network Forum, held on January 25-26. Four consortia of healthcare stakeholders provided demonstrations of health information exchange prototypes developed through HHS funding over the past year. The HHS forum also included presentations and discussion of various approaches to business models for sustaining health information service providers and exchange.

More info: http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=6395

Worth a Read: Articles of Interest to the Healthcare IT Field

Mastering Satisfaction
By: Greg Goth
HealthCare Informatics, February, 2007

Customer satisfaction and the rise of RHIOs will make the enterprise master patient index a popular technology in 2007.
Read article

Handhelds Get a Grip
By: David Raths
Healthcare Informatics, February, 2007

As personal wireless devices become more sophisticated, healthcare practitioners are finding them harder to put down.
Read article

Everything to Everyone
By: Greg Goth
Healthcare Informatics, February, 2007

Big fish swallow little fish for market share; should providers take the bait?
Read article

Looking Abroad
By: Kayt Sukel
Healthcare Informatics, February, 2007

U.S. healthcare providers can learn a thing or two about IT best practices by checking out other countries.
Read article