[FOSS_health] Interoperability - GK3 Panel Session

[Molly Cheah]

Joseph, it would be more useful if comments is supported by 
suggestions/examples.
Anyway, this is IDRC's suggested proposal:

> *Title*: Health outcomes: The role of ICT applications, standards and 
> practices
>
> *Overview*: This panel examines the central issue of health outcomes 
> through the lens of innovative ICT applications, standards and 
> practices in developing countries. The session provides an inclusive 
> overview of key issues pertaining to: changing health landscapes and 
> realities, specific examples highlighting ICT-enabled solutions, and 
> crosscutting issues of standards and interoperability of health 
> systems – including the role of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS).
>
> Developed in a way to stimulate discussion within and among the 
> panelists and audience members, the panel balances both practical and 
> theoretical considerations, questions and concerns related to the role 
> of ICTs in achieving beneficial health outcomes.
>
The above suggestion came in while I was asleep and have yet the 
opportunity to respond. My reaction is the missing "open" to preceed 
standards.
Comments please? IDRC wants the final comments end of the day (Ottawa time).

Molly
Joseph Dal Molin wrote:

> There is a direct connection between "interoperability" and the 
> "usefulness of ICTs in relation to health outcomes". Ignoring the 
> semantics of what exactly "interoperability" means... for the GK3 
> audience it will have a very general interpretation... I suggest you 
> pursue that avenue to link the two session abstracts.
>
> Joseph
>
> Molly Cheah wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> As a follow-up of the discussion on interoperability and Lee Seldon's 
>> summary, those who attended the OSHCA conference in KL in May will 
>> remember that OSHCA had submitted a proposal to present at a panel 
>> session "ICTs and Health" at GK3 in KL in December 2007. The session 
>> title may be modified to make it sound more attractive. See 
>> http://www.globalknowledge.org/gkps_portal/index.cfm?&menuid=627&parentid=676 
>>
>>
>> OSHCA's submission had to go through IDRC as a partner because OSHCA 
>> is not a member of Globalknowledge.org. Recent update from IDRC is 
>> that OSHCA's submission had been merged with IDRC's own submission to 
>> become a panel session on the main conference to be restructured and 
>> renamed.
>>
>> The original submissions are as follows:
>>
>> Session Summary from OSHCA:*
>> *
>>
>> "Open Source Health Care Alliance (OSHCA) believes that Free/Open 
>> Source Health Care Software will provide a viable and sustainable 
>> alternative in mainstream Information and Communication Technologies 
>> (ICT) for positive impact in health outcomes as adjunct to building a 
>> global knowledge society. Ability to share data in healthcare 
>> provides the greatest potential for such impact. The need for 
>> interoperability, open standards and data exchange in FOSS technology 
>> is felt most in the developing world. Many FOSS applications in 
>> healthcare have in fact been developed in relative isolation from 
>> each other. Notwithstanding their commitment to being open and 
>> standards compliant, there currently is no “forum” and facility to 
>> test and develop interoperability among FOSS health applications. 
>> Hence its crucial that these issues are addressed if moving the FOSS 
>> agenda for health especially in developing countries is to become a 
>> reality."
>>
>>
>> Session Summary from IDRC:
>> "This panel discussion will focus on numerous issues related to the 
>> usefulness of ICTs in relation to health outcomes. It will explore 
>> the different experiences various partners have had with using 
>> ICT-enabled health applications in developing countries. Amongst the 
>> key areas the panel will focus on, special attention will be placed 
>> on ICT interventions in the area of prevention, administration, 
>> clinical uses, education and research. More specifically, panelists 
>> will describe how ICTs can prevent the spread of diseases, improve 
>> the efficiency of health systems and make treatments more effective."
>>
>> Unfortunately, time is not on our side for refining these changes but 
>> I have communicated with IDRC that it is agreeable that the amended 
>> approaches for the GK3 panel should be seen seamlessly and to go 
>> beyond individual applications. IDRC has earmarked the presentation 
>> of the PANACeA project and OpenMRS at GK3. For us on this mailing 
>> list the discussions had gone beyond how to have interoperability to 
>> work but actually planning to test such interoperability concepts in 
>> real locations and we already have a summary of the discussions from 
>> Lee Seldon posted here.
>>
>> For the GK3 presentation amended proposal, in addition to presenting 
>> issues on using open standards to address interoperability and 
>> therefore enabling data exchange, we should be able to put together 
>> several examples of interoperability initiatives among FOSS health 
>> applications for the actual presentation in December. Discussions to 
>> be included should also evolve around the different types/levels of 
>> interoperability and whether its sufficient to have "functional" 
>> interoperability and the use of specific message format for 
>> communications. In discussing options, it may be necessary to touch 
>> on how interoperability works, features, how to implement, standards 
>> compliance, advantages, disadvantages etc.
>>
>> I hope these ideas may be considered for the merged proposal texts 
>> but if any of you would like to express further views, please express 
>> them here on this list so that I can include them in my responses to 
>> IDRC.
>>
>> Rgds,
>> Molly
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>>
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