I wasn't able to attend Medinfo so I appreciate Andrew's review. I am
surprised that is was "smallish" as the Medinfo conference I participated in
back in 96 in Vancouver was quite large....not that bigger is
better.....looking forward to Andrew's comments on OSHCA 2001
Joseph
-------
Joseph Dal Molin
e-cology corporation
1.416.232.1206
----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Ho" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, September 14, 2001 5:54 PM
Subject: Report from Medinfo2001
> Dear colleagues,
>
> What follows is what I learned and what I think may interest the
> openhealth participants. Hopefully my omissions, errors, and bias will be
> quickly pointed out, challenged, and corrected. (Horst Herb, David
> Chan, Cito Maramba, the Minoru team, and perhaps others from this list
> were also there. :-)
>
> 1. Medinfo2001 meeting (London) is a smallish meeting that draws primarily
> publicly-funded projects/developers/government staffers. Commercial
> vendors/consultant types are visibly under-represented.
>
> 2. Familiarity with open source methods are high. Major obstacle to
> releasing code seems to be lack of interest or fear of forming/supporting
> a developer/user community. There is apparently little funding incentive
> for this. Many projects with production code and even professed plan to
> release code may choose to delay release of code for this reason.
>
> 3. Several publicly-funded projects are on the verge of going open-source.
> For example, PICNIC (http://www.medcom.dk/picnic/OpenSource/default.htm),
> BSTD (http://itch.uvic.ca/itch2000/PRUNA/PRUNA.HTM), and perhaps certain
> automated guildeline projects (EsPer?).
>
> 4. Minoru/EuSpirit had part of the large EU booth. Brian Bray, Dave Scott,
> and Bud Bruegger took turns there. A video of MUFFIN starring David Chan
> M.D. was playing in the background. It was too bad that they were not
> able to hand out a CD or URL that contains downloadable/runnable open
> source software. A live demo system would be good too.
>
> 5. The vast majority of presentors have not and do not have plans to make
> their code available for peer-review or re-use. This makes the Medinfo2001
> experience rather frustrating. One hears success story after success story
> - without the ability to know what was done or replicate/build-upon each
> other's "success". Very very sad.
>
> 6. The level of participant interactions and discussions was extremely
> low. Critical remarks are entirely absent. Congratulatory comments are
> rampant. Maybe this has to do with the number of famous professors and
> department directors? (And, perhaps made worse by the strangulating effect
> of the ubiquitous neck ties??)
>
> 7. This makes me wonder about the future of the every 3-year Medinfo
> meeting. Maybe the OSHCA annual meeting will become the favorite for the
> working medical systems researchers?
>
> (my impression of OSHCA2001 to follow)
>
> Best regards,
>
> Andrew
> ---
> Andrew P. Ho, M.D.
> OIO:Open Infrastructure for Outcomes
> www.TxOutcome.Org
> Assistant Clinical Professor
> Department of Psychiatry, Harbor-UCLA Medical Center
> University of California, Los Angeles
>
>
>
