Why Patients Weren’t Included at #HIMSS16 & Why They Will Be at #HIMSS17

Caveat: I in no way mean to imply that my actions are solely, or even substantially, reasons for change. But change is coming, and I’m part of it! Before HIMSS 2016, I couldn’t shake the thought: where were patients at healthcare events — and why weren’t we doing more to include them? Since a number of brilliant patient advocates (looking at you, Casey Quinlan,Dave de Bronkart, Jess Jacobs, Carly Medosch), opened my eyes to the issues plaguing patient representation at healthcare events, I started speaking up at every opportunity — conference steering committee meetings, with my own marketing team, across social media platforms: “Hey, I’ve got an idea — how about we put a patient on the main stage?” “Hey, how about we use some of the marketing budget to bring a patient?” “Hey, how about a patient participant for the roundtable?” Now, I’m pretty loud, and persistent, but that doesn’t always translate into being heard: I was only marginally successful at affecting change. Still, early successes (particularly with my own organization’s events) gave me hope that this gap could be closed. So, I set my sights on including patients at HIMSS, the largest health IT conference in the world. Go big or go home, right? I wrote a quick post on easy, specifics steps individuals and organizations could take to facilitate inclusion. I was surprised by the response that post received — and thrilled when several vendor friends offered their unus...
Source: Society for Participatory Medicine - Category: Journals (General) Authors: Tags: Editorial Newsletter e-patients Himss HIMSS16 HIMSS17 patients at conferences patients included patients not included Source Type: news