ANIA-CARING 2009 ANNUAL CONFERENCE REPORT
"Raising the Stakes for Nursing Informatics" was the subject matter of the third ANIA-CARING collaborative conference held in Las Vegas, NV, on April 23-25, 2009. More than 300 attendees had the opportunity to hear three keynote speeches, attend four preconference sessions, choose from simultaneous presentations, view posters, and speak with 18 exhibitors.
The four preconference sessions offering a more in-depth look at a variety of topics were the following: "Writing for Publication" by Kathleen C. Kimmel and Carlene Anteau; "Project Management for Nurses" by Brian Gugerty and Lisa Anne Bove; "Making Change-The Dollar and Sense Essentials of System Implementation by Marina Douglas; and "Measuring Clinical Acceptance and Outcomes of Clinical Information Systems" by Victoria M. Bradley and Steve Shaha.
The Thursday evening exhibitors' reception kicked off the 3-day event. The attendees had plenty of time to talk to the vendor representatives, network, and eat. The location of the conference was the Las Vegas Hilton and was familiar to attendees of previous nursing informatics events.
Keynote speaker, Marilyn Chow, DNSc, RN, FAAN, from Kaiser Permanente, presented "How Nurses Spend Their Time: Effects on Quality and Safety in Hospitals." Dr Chow also presented her organizations' past successes as well as their innovative work at a technology prototype center.
Kathleen Shinn, BSN, RN, presented her very personal account entitled "Alyssa's Story: The Heart of a Medical Error." Her infant daughter was victim of a medical error that tragically resulted in her death. Kathleen recommended changes that need to be implemented within technology as well as processes to prevent medical errors. The attendees were spellbound by her words, applauded her courage to speak, and vowed to make changes in practice to prevent medication errors.
The closing keynote speaker was Marion J. Ball, EdD, FHIMSS, FCHIME, who discussed "Emerging Technologies: Transforming Health Care: Current and Future Impact on Patient Safety, Culture, and Process." She discussed many concepts including successful implementation, impact on patient safety, culture and processes, people, and technology.
Other sessions were refereed papers and posters. Approximately, papers were presented by members and others. The novice-to-expert level of the attendees was considered in selecting papers. There were four simultaneous tracks, making it difficult to select from the many great presentations. Awards were given for the three top posters selected by the attendees. A highlight was getting the proceedings on a flash drive at the beginning of the conference.
ANIA and CARING members heard reports from the respective presidents, James J. Finley (ANIA) and Jerald T. Chamberlain (CARING), during the ANIACARING Membership Celebration Luncheon. A major topic of discussion was the impending merger of the two organizations. Victoria M. Bradley, chair of the conference committee, and her team were thanked for their efforts in planning this year's event.
The theme of the 2010 ANIACARING conference is "Re-Evolution in Nursing Informatics" and will be held in Boston, MA, at the Westin Waterfront. Dr Peter J. Murray, acting director of the International Medical Informatics Association, is the invited keynote speaker.
Do consider attending the 2010 event for education, networking, great seafood, and fun! For further information about ANIA, visit http://www.ania.org, and for CARING, visit http://www.caringonline.org. By the time you read this article, we should be merged into ANIACARING at http://www.ania-caring.org.
Contributed by Susan K. Newbold, PhD, RN-BC, FAAN, FHIMSS
UNBOUND MEDICINE RELEASES MEDICAL APPLICATIONS FOR ANDROID MOBILE PLATFORM
Unbound Medicine has announced the availability of premier medical references for smartphones running the Android mobile technology platform from Google Inc. The Unbound Platform already supports native applications for popular handheld devices including iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, and Palm. With the addition of Android support, the Unbound Platform further enables healthcare professionals to access up-to-date medical knowledge from the device of their choice.
Among Unbound's products now available for Android are best-selling medical and nursing titles that help clinicians answer questions at the point of need. These include The Merck Manual from Merck & Co Inc, Davis's Drug Guide and Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary from F.A. Davis, and the Five-Minute Clinical Consult from Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. In addition, Unbound's unique aggregated offerings for individuals and institutions, Nursing Central and uCentral, may be downloaded to Android devices.
Unbound's applications feature Android-specific navigation, rapid search, easy-to-scan text, highresolution images, integrated audio, bookmarking, links to 18 million journal articles in MEDLINE, and extensive cross-linking between resources.
Adding an Unbound application to an Android phone is simple. Customers can purchase from a personal computer or directly from an Android device using Unbound's on-device catalog. Content download occurs in seconds over a wireless connection.
To view the list of products currently available for Android and the demonstration screen views, visit http://www.unboundmedicine.com/android.
Unbound Medicine Inc (http://www.unboundmedicine.com) seeks to develop next-generation knowledge management systems for healthcare. The company's handheld, wireless, and Web-based technology platform and its information architecture services are designed to provide healthcare professionals with advanced systems for acquiring, managing, and sharing knowledge.
THOMSON REUTERS RELEASES ENDNOTE X3 FOR WINDOWS
The Healthcare and Science division of Thomson Reuters has announced a major upgrade to EndNote for Windows, the bibliographic management software used by researchers, librarians, and students worldwide. The new version, EndNote X3, including EndNote Web, delivers a collaborative solution that makes users more productive. EndNote X3 expands ways to group references and find full text when off campus. Cite While You Write now integrates with OpenOffice.org Writer 3, unveils unique support for chemistry styles, and offers more bibliography format styles.
Other features include the ability to create multiple bibliographies within a Word document; use composite styles (group citations by number and letter) that are popular with chemistry journals; organize references easily with new groups, containing both custom and smart groups; find more full text with EZProxy, a method of gaining access to online collections off-campus; collaborate using EndNote Web, now included with EndNote; and organize personal publication lists for the ResearcherID author community using EndNote Web.
To view EndNote X3 pricing, visit Endnote.com.
Thomson Reuters is a provider of intelligent information for businesses and professionals and seeks to combine industry expertise with innovative technology to deliver critical information to leading decision makers in the financial, legal, tax and accounting, scientific, healthcare, and media markets. More information is available at thomsonreuters.com.
CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE[horizontal ellipsis]
Susan K. Newbold, PhD, RN-BC, FAAN, FHIMSS, is Associate Professor of Nursing Informatics at Vanderbilt School of Nursing in Nashville, TN.
William Perry, MA, RN, is Adjunct Instructor, Wright State University, Dayton, OH.