Biomedical and Health Informatics at SILS and UNC

1. Biomedical and Health Informatics at SILS and UNC Javed Mostafa Professor SILS & BRIC UNC at Chapel Hill

2. What is Informatics? • Informatics is the science of information, where information is defined as data with meaning. Biomedical-/Clinical-/Public Health- informatics is the science of information applied to, or studied in the context of Biomedical-/Clinical-/Public Health. Bernstam, E., Smith, J., & Johnson, T. What is Biomedical Informatics? (2009). J. of Biomedical Informatics, 43(2010): 104-110.

3. … Clinical Informatics • American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) recently approved the Core Content of “subspecialty” of Clinical Informatics • Clinical Informaticians transform health care by analyzing, designing, implementing, and evaluating information and communication systems … that enhance individual, population health outcomes, improve patient care, and strengthen the clinician-patient relationship Gardner et al. (2009). Core content for the subspecialty of clinical informatics. JAMIA, 16(2), 153-157.

4. Tremendous Opportunity Now • Meaningful use (Blumenthal, 2010) • Improving quality, safety and efficiency • Engaging patients in their care • Increasing coordination of care • Improving the health status of the population • Ensuring privacy and security • Eligible professionals and eligible hospitals started receiving incentive payments for achieving meaningful use of EHRs in 2011 Hersh, W. (2010). Biomedical and Health Informatics: Improving Health, Healthcare, and Biomedical Research with Information Technology. Presented at the Annual CTSA Conference, Washington DC.

5. US Funding HI Education • ONC estimates 50,000 workers needed to implement federal HIT agenda (Monegain, 2009) • ONC is funding $118 million for • Community college consortia ($70M) • Curriculum Development Centers ($10M) • Competency testing ($6M) • University training grants ($32M) • Will provide scholarship funding for graduate Hersh, W. (2010). Biomedical and Health Informatics: Improving Health, Healthcare, and Biomedical Research with Information Technology. Presented at the Annual CTSA Conference, Washington DC.

6. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology • Information technology (IT) has the potential to transform healthcare as it has transformed many parts of our economy and society in recent decades. Properly implemented, health IT can: • Integrate technology into the flow of clinical practice as an asset, while minimizing unproductive data entry work. • Give clinicians real-time access to complete patient data, and provide them with information support to make the best decisions. • Help patients become more involved in their own care. • Enable a range of population-level public health monitoring and real-time research. • Improve clinical trials, leading to more rapid advances in personalized medicine. • Streamline processes, increase their transparency, and reduce administrative overhead, as it has in other industries. • Lead to the creation of new high-technology markets and jobs. • Help support a range of economic reforms in the healthcare system that will be needed to address our Nation’s long-term fiscal challenges.

7. Career • Inflow may include students with biology, computer science, mathematics, IT, information science, library science, business, communication, medical, nursing, pharmacy, public health backgrounds • Job options include academia, industry, health care facilities, insurance providers, and IT companies

8. Broad Umbrella @ UNC Biomedical/Clinical Informatics Nursing/Systems Informatics Public Health Informatics Informatics

9. Critical Areas and Their Interactions Health Care Health Informatics The Health System Information & Communications Technology Health Care – provision of care services to an individual, group, and / or population Health system – organization, policies, quality, data management

10. UNC Certificates • SILS – Clinical Info Sci • BS/BA with health care / technical background • SoN – Health Care Systems – Informatics • Post master’s • Gillings SPH – Public Health Informatics

11. UNC Status I • Carolina Health Informatics Program (CHIP) • Supported through • Office of the National Coordinator / Health and Human Services • National Institutes of Health / National Center for Research Resources • Office of the Provost – UNC – CH • SILS • SoM • SoN • Gillings SPH

12. UNC – Duke Collaboration • UNC and Duke have formed a consortium for the ONC/HHS grant • Together we received support at the level 2.1 million dollars • We started our recruitment in late summer 2010 and had interaction with about 25 students (serious prospects) • 5 recruited to the program (fall of 2010) • We are currently at 31 • UNC’s target is to recruit about 40 students by 2012 for the certificate and (eventually) degree programs

13. Who are the competitors? • There are approximately 30-35 programs concentrating on biomedical, biological, chemical, clinical, nursing, public health informatics • The number is rapidly rising … a recent addition is UC San Diego – Division of Biomedical Informatics (summer 2009)

14. The “Club” of 18

15. Long-term Plans • Master’s program in biomedical and health informatics • We are actively seeking industrial collaborations – “Media Lab” for Health IT • We are developing grants/contracts in data management and mining, HCI, data quality, and IT spinoff potentials

16. Questions? • Javed: jm@unc.edu • Useful links: • SILS: http://sils.unc.edu • TraCS: http://tracs.unc.edu • Others: • Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) • – http://healthit.hhs.gov • American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) • – http://www.amia.org • National Library of Medicine (NLM) • – http://www.nlm.nih.gov