HIE Wire   back to index

From bjhc&im: Br J Healthcare Comput Info Manage 2001; 18(6): 4

The European Union’s new health telematics research and development programme for the next ten years will be a core focus for the medinfo-2001 Congress in September.

The Congress will provide a special showcase for the next phase of the EU’s health telematics R&D programme, which is expected to incorporate in its scope the emergence of ehealth (in the wider context of eEurope), initiatives on telemedicine and increasingly significant genomics and neurosciences research perspectives.

Outline funding details will also be revealed. The previous programme (1991–2000) involved a budget of well over 400m euros. Spending on the new R&D programme for the period 2001–11 might dwarf this figure.

It will be the first time that a medinfo event explicitly attempts to bring together the academic and operational side of healthcare informatics activities.

Jean Roberts, who leads the medinfo2001 Local Organising Committee, told the Journal: “There has been a dysfunctionality in the past between the scientific, research and operational aspects of healthcare informatics. We hope that, by encouraging everyone to come together, the Congress will help to create understanding and break down barriers and entrenched views.”