Current Projects

AMIA
Academic
Forum

Task Force: Task Force on Informatics-related Roles and Categorization
Charge: To develop a white/position paper that presents a structure, building upon prevailing definitions, for describing and categorizing the varying roles, functions and related certification needs among those working in the discipline of biomedical informatics or closely related fields.
Key Objectives:

1. Describe at high level what training/knowledge distinguishes an informatician from a non-informatician
2. Describe at high level what distinguishes a “practice-oriented” informatician from a “non-practice-oriented” informatician and how that relates to needs for accreditation of programs and certification of individuals
3. Disseminate and share findings with the AMIA Academic Forum Task Force working on determination of certification planning for Informaticians to inform their efforts

The overall purpose of the Nursing Informatics History Project is to document and preserve the history of nursing informatics through three activities:

1. Nursing informatics pioneers and nursing informatics organizations have been solicited to preserve their materials in an archive at the National Library of Medicine started by Dr. Virginia Saba in 1997.
2. Stories of the pioneers in nursing informatics are being videotaped and made available through AMIA's web site.
3. Historical research is planned to document the evolution of informatics as a specialty in nursing.

Judith J. Warren, PhD, RN, BC, FAAN, FACMI is honored by AMIA as a Nursing Informatics Pioneer. Click here to listen to her story.

A short-term health information technology (IT) training project is being completed by staff from the Center of Health Informatics for the Kansas Health Association. The project start date was June 2012, and will commence on December 31, 2012. The project aims to develop training materials for hospital staff in Kansas. The education will be on basic health IT specifically focusing on benefits and patient rights, and consistent with KHIE message. A script will be developed including content from the revised notice of privacy practices, for use by frontline Kansas hospital staff. Lastly, the project staff will develop a training webinar for Kansas hospital trainers and serve as the presenter for this webinar. Dr. Victoria Wangia is the PI on this project.

Project Scope:

1. Develop basic health IT training for Kansas hospital staff specific to benefits and patient rights, and consistent with KHIE messages.
2. Develop a script including information about the revised notice of privacy practices for use by frontline Kansas hospital staff.
3. Develop training webinar for KS hospital trainers and present webinar.

NLM Tools for EHR Certification and Meaningful Use

The NLM provides free access to vocabulary standards, applications, and related tools that can be used to meet US EHR certification criteria and to achieve Meaningful Use of EHRs. Resources are either created by or supported by NLM can be used for interpreting standardized lists of problems, http://www.nlm.nih.gov/healthit/meaningful_use.html.

The SNOMED CT® encoded Nursing Problem List Subset, intended for use in patients’ problem lists, is an output of the Unified Medical Language System® (UMLS®) Metathesaurus® that is based on nursing diagnosis concepts found within the Metathesaurus. The list is free for use in the U.S.A. Please download it from http://www.nlm.nih.gov/research/umls/Snomed/nursing_problemlist_subset.html

The main purpose of the Nursing Problem List Subset of SNOMED CT is to facilitate the use of SNOMED CT as the primary coding terminology for nursing problems used in care planning, problem lists or other summary level clinical documentation. This list was developed and maintained by a team co-led by our own Judith Warren. For information on the development of the list, please read: Matney, S.A., Warren, J.J., Evans, J.L., Kim, T.Y., Coenen, A., & Auld, V.A. (2012). Development of the nursing problem list subset of SNOMED CT®. Journal of Biomedical Informatics, 45(4), 683-688.