The UW Division of Biomedical and Health Informatics is a Charter Member of the AMIA Academic Forum (http://www.amia.org/inside/initiatives/acadforum/).

Peter Tarczy-Hornoch has been working as a member of the Steering Committee to establish this forum. The mission of the AMIA Academic Forum is to "promote the development of biomedical and health informatics as an academic discipline. The Forum provides a vehicle for surveying and analyzing activities in academic units dedicated to biomedical and health informatics and for recommending best practices related to education, scholarship, faculty development, and faculty retention. The Forum provides a locus for discussion of national research initiatives in informatics and a round table that facilitates collaboration among different academic units to further their objectives for education and research.

Raven Travillian new position at Children's
Ravensara Travillian has accepted the position of Biomedical/Health Informatician at Children's Hospital beginning on June 1. She will be working on data integration and knowledge discovery from heterogenous clinical, biomedical, and research data sources 

Congratulations to Deanna Petrochilos, BHI Doctoral Student
Deanna has been offered a summer internship in cancer informatics at Genentech in South San Francisco.  Deanna has also been awarded a tuition scholarship for the 2007 Summer Institute in Statistical Genetics at the University of Washington

Promotion of Dr. Peter Mork 
Peter on his new role: "I am happy to share that I have recently been promoted to AC5, Principal Technical Staff at The MITRE Corporation (McLean, VA).  I am currently leading a research project the goal of which is to facilitate matchmaking among scientists.  In this project, we assume that scientists are often reluctant to share their data widely, but will collaborate with trusted partners.  As a result, many useful data languish in their lab of origin.  Our research provides a mechanism for scientists to advertise their data without exposing the precise contents of their database to help foster new collaborations. This promotion was based in part on work I did with Dr. Len Seligman on schema matching that led to a best paper award and a patent (pending).  I was also recognized for assisting colleagues with the development of research proposals and prototype tools for data sharing.  I also have the opportunity to advise the National Center for Research Resources on technical issues."

Bond, G. E., Burr, R., Wolf, F. M., Price, M., McCurry, S. M., & Teri, L. The effects of a Web-based intervention on the physical outcomes associated with diabetes among adults age 60 and older: A randomized trial. Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics,/ /2007; 9(1):52-9.

Cunningham, M.R., Warme, W.J., Schaad, D.C., Wolf, F.M., & Leopold, S. S. Industry-funded positive studies not associated with better design or larger size. Clinical Orthopaedics & Related Research, 2007(Apr); 457: 235-241.

Congratulations to Meredith Skeels, BHI graduate student and NLM fellow, who has been offered a summer internship at Microsoft Research.

Wanda Pratt, Associate Professor of the Information School and Biomedical and Health Informatics received a $10,000 gift from Intel as part of their Technology for Long Term Care (or TLC) project

Chunhua Weng, our first BHI Ph.D. graduate, has been offered and has accepted a position as a tenure-track Assistant Professor at Columbia University, in their Dep't of Biomedical Informatics. After completing her postdoctoral program at Pittsburgh, she will start at Columbia this summer

BHI Presentation by Leslie Lenert, MD
1:00-1:50pm, Mary Gates Hall, Rm. 234

Leslie Lenert, MD
Director of the Health Services Research and Development, Veterans Medical Research Foundation; Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Diego School of Medicine; Staff Physician, VA San Diego Healthcare System; and Associate Director of Medical Informatics at the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (CalIT 2 ).  

"Wireless Internet Information System for Medical Response in Disasters"

Called the Wireless Internet Information System for Medical Response in Disasters, or WIISARD. The use of sophisticated wireless technology to coordinate and enhance care of mass casualties in a terrorist attack or natural disaster is the focus of a new federally funded research project at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). The project brings together broad-based participation from academia, industry, the military and emergency responders from the City and County of San Diego. https://www.wiisard.org/

Dr. Leslie Lenert is Director of the Health Services Research and Development section of the Veterans Medical Research Foundation, Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, Staff Physician at the VA San Diego Healthcare System  and Associate Director of Medical Informatics at the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (CalIT 2 ). A graduate of the University of California, Riverside and the University of California , Los Angeles School of Medicine, he completed postgraduate training in Internal Medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and a Fellowship in Clinical Pharmacology at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Washington state was fortunate to received two of the Requirements Development grants- one in Preparedness and one in Chronic Disease, both supported by faculty of the UW Center for Public Health Informatics.

Anne Turner, MD, MPH, MLIS and Janet Baseman, PhD, MPH, in partnership with Kitsap County Health District, have been funded to define and evaluate the current business processes in the area of chronic disease prevention and control. The three-year, $600,000 award was announced in December 2006.  

BRYANT KARRAS, M.D. will serve as a project team member of the Spokane Regional Health District SRHD Prepareness Project and will give guidance and provide critical insight into the project's activities including expertise in public health informatics. Spokane Regional Health District SRHD Preparedness project is focused on communication system development around emergency operations centers and response to disease outbreaks. This 3-year grant has an annual budget of $200,000. He will provide this ongoing follow up and support to the team throughout the 3 year grant period.