Bethesda, Md.--The International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) and the Global Health Informatics Partnership (GHIP) have announced a strategic alliance to strengthen health information and communication (HICT) systems, create learning modules appropriate for a wide variety of workers in public health and clinical roles, and facilitate infrastructures and policies that support sustained investment in HICT and informatics at the global level. The alliance also will support the development of local and regional centers of excellence in health informatics. The two organizations signed a joint Letter of Understanding in Washington, DC, during AMIA's recently held 34th Annual Symposium on Biomedical and Health Informatics, with IMIA President Antoine Geissbuhler and AMIA President and CEO Ted Shortliffe serving as signators.
"The new strategic alliance between IMIA and GHIP enables an international approach to health informatics collaboration that draws upon a global range of expertise," said Dr. Shortliffe. "At the same time, IMIA and AMIA will focus on strengthening local capacity at all levels."
The alliance's strategic goals will be met through several key activities:
- Facilitating the development of local workforce capacity for biomedical and health informatics to support applications in public health, clinical care, and research;
- Targeted support-- with educational material based on best practices--of public health and clinical decision-makers, health workers, and technicians who work in HICT systems;
- Evaluation of current infrastructure and policies to ensure a positive environment is built for HICT and informatics education/information dissemination.
Dr. Geissbuhler observed, "Achieving these goals requires intensified international collaboration as well as development and strengthening of local and regional centers of excellence in health informatics so that they are able to support local projects while being connected globally."
About IMIA and GHIP
The International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) is the world body for health and biomedical informatics. As an association of associations, IMIA serves as a bridge, bringing together member societies, academic institutions, and other organizations and their memberships. IMIA provides leadership and expertise to the multidisciplinary, health-focused community and to policy makers, to enable the transformation of healthcare through health informatics in accord with the world-wide vision of improving the health of the world population. More information is at http://www.imia.org
GHIP is an international learning community that engages institutional stakeholders as well as a broad range of interested professionals. It is dedicated to knowledge-transfer activities and supports a collaborative ecosystem for initiatives focused on individuals who are developing solutions to problems in real-world settings, guided by established informatics principles. Much of GHIP's work is carried out through its portal at http://www.ghip.net. GHIP is a wholly-owned subsidiary of AMIA, the leading organization for informatics professionals, online at www.amia.org.