HL7 New Zealand Announcements From Atlanta WGM
HL7 New Zealand – Press Release: September 30, 2019
HL7 New Zealand is pleased to announce that one of its founding members, Martin Entwistle, has been elected as a Fellow of HL7® International in recognition of his outstanding commitment and sustained contribution to HL7 International over a fifteen-year period. Martin was inducted into the HL7 Fellows Programme at September’s Working Group Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
Also announced at this meeting was the result of recent elections held for the HL7 International Board of Directors and we’re delighted to report that HL7 New Zealand Chair, Peter Jordan was elected to the position of Affiliate Director. Peter will become the first New Zealander to be represented on this Board when he commences a two year term on January 1st, 2020.
Further details of the Working Group Meeting, attended by a record number of 778 participants, can be found on the HL7NZ Web Site.
HL7 FHIR Connectathon #22
A record 420 attendees participated in the HL7 FHIR Connectathon #22, held in Atlanta, Georgia, USA on 14-15 September 2019. The combination of experienced FHIR developers and newcomers to the standard were divided into 38 specialist tracks varying from established areas of the specification, such as Patient and Terminology, to newer domains like genomics and major FHIR-based implementation projects notably ‘Da Vinci’. It was a hugely enjoyable and successful event – both in terms of advancing the FHIR specification and continuing to build the worldwide FHIR community.
HL7 New Zealand Spring News 2019
Hi Everyone – in the words of the song “spring is in the air” and this is reflected in a number of exciting new developments in New Zealand’s digital health landscape. In particular, we’ve seen the recentpublication of two documents of major significance for the implementation of our standards; namely the Ministry of Health’s
Digital, data and technology services – minimum requirements and the Interim Report of the New Zealand Health & Disability System Review. The later, while not containing specific recommendations (these are to appear in a the Final Report tabled for next year), contains strong messages about the need for interoperability standards as a critical enabler of digital health and the former clearly articulates the need for conformance to, and compliance with, those standards.
On a practical level, HL7NZ is fully supportiveof the planned national Health Information Platform(nHIP) as a replacement for the single Electronic Health Record project and we view APIs built using HL7®FHIR® as key building blocks for this Platform. This will enable New Zealand to extend and adapt, significant work already performed overseas and recently, as part of our strong relationship with HISO, we’ve been pleased to recommend the use of the International Patient Summary.
Following our successful Mid-Year Seminar, we’ve also been busy developing a new Web Site and we’re planning to update this with news and events on a regular basis. As you’ll see from the banner, New Zealand is celebrating 25 years of HL7 implementation and to mark this occasion, HL7 New Zealand will be presenting an Anniversary Award, at the 2019 HiNZ Conference in Hamilton, for “Consistent Support for HL7 Standards in New Zealand”. Candidates for this award are those current Organisational Members of HL7 New Zealand, who have used HL7 standards for a significant portion of the past 25 years. An account of those years can be found here.
Digital Health Week NZ – including HiNZ Conference 2019
We’re keenly anticipating New Zealand’s largest digital health event and this will include a Standards Workshop featuring HL7®FHIR®and SNOMED CT®, on Tuesday 19thNovember. Once again, HiNZ had kindly provided us with a Booth (#93) in the Conference Exhibition Hall and we encourage you all to pay us a visit there. We’ll also be holding our AGM at 12:30pm on Wednesday 20thNovember – all members welcome.
Further details can be found in the Conference Programme. Registrations can be made here and HL7NZ members are, once again, eligible for the special low “affiliate member” rate.
