Tag Archives: health information technology

37,000 of my closest friends and I attended the HIMSS Conference last week in Las Vegas.  For those of you who don’t have a propeller permanently implanted in your head, HIMSS stands for the Health Industry Management Systems Society.  It is an industry association self-proclaimed to be focused on “transforming healthcare through information technology.”

Despite the fact that I have worked in and around healthcare information technology (“HIT”) for nearly 25 years (since I was 7), I had never been to HIMSS before.  This year, when HIT has become the new, new thing once again, I decided I should check it out.

Have you ever gone to the park where there are a hundred kids attempting to co-exist in the sandbox with one shovel?  As you would expect, there would be a lot of screaming, pushing, shoving, cajoling, cringing and toddler-on-toddler contact as everyone jockeyed for control of the shovel.  That’s what HIMSS felt like to me.  There was such a cacophony of noise, information and activity that I went into sensory overload the minute I stepped into the conference area.  In Las Vegas, that’s saying something.  I have become somewhat … (read the rest)