News Release - November 1999

medinfo2001 - BACKGROUND NOTES :

INTERNATIONAL MEDICAL INFORMATICS ASSOCIATION

IMIA was established in 1978 as a constituent body of the International Federation of Information Processing. It is a federation of national representatives from over 50 countries, in conjunction with Institutional Members from academia and commercial organisations, world-wide. The UK is represented through the British Computer Society by one of its Technical Committees - the Health Informatics Committee.

BRITISH COMPUTER SOCIETY

The British Computer Society (BCS) has been the UK representative organisation in international medical informatics since the formation of International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP) Technical Committee TC4, the forerunner of IMIA. Currently the BCS has a Board level Technical Committee which represents the five specialist groups of the Society concerned with the medical/health informatics field and a number of other organisations with similar synergistic activities. The BCS was established in 1957 and received its Royal Charter as the Society for Information Science in 1986. Overall there are over 30,000 members at grades from student to Honorary Fellow. The Patron of the BCS is His Royal Highness, the Duke of Kent who is a past-President and takes an active interest in all the activities of the Society.

HEALTH INFORMATICS COMMITTEE

The BCS Health / Medical Informatics Technical Committee (HIC formerly called HISG) has collective objectives addressing:

• the provision of a focus and point of contact for health informatics for and about the UK, both nationally and, increasingly, on an international basis
• the coalition of relevant bodies for the purpose of exchanging ideas, promoting developments, maximising synergy and co-ordinating efforts
• the effective dissemination of the message of sound principles and good practice in health informatics
• the submission of informed comment on topical issues and major initiatives
• the facilitation of communication of UK activity in health informatics on a wider basis
• the management of an annual conference and exhibition (and contribution to similar focused specialist group events) as a recognised national forum for these objectives
  

STATUS OF HEALTH/MEDICAL INFORMATICS IN THE UK

The substantive development of health/medical informatics in the UK dates from the early 1960's; the first computer being installed in 1961 at the Manchester Regional Health Board. Since that time the UK has stayed in the forefront of development, both of operational informatics and scientific research disciplines. The UK activity in

health/medical informatics is extensive and is exemplified by considerable working together between academic and operational groups. Over the years, the movement of specialists in health informatics has been a two-way process between scientific research and the operational development, implementation and management of systems to the benefit of healthcare delivery.

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