2018 IHE® Connectathon Draws Leading HIT Vendors

Top health information technology (HIT) vendors gathered in Cleveland in January for the Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE®) North American Connectathon.

The event gives companies a unique opportunity to test their software and other tools and make adjustments to products—often on the spot—to ensure compliance with IHE-endorsed standards. IHE is an initiative by healthcare professionals and industry to improve the way healthcare computer systems share information. More than 63 organizations and 500 individuals participated in the live, cross-vendor, supervised and structured event. Nearly 90 systems were tested this year.

An event within the Connectathon is the Plug-a-thon, which offered participants the ability to explore and create new capabilities for products that interoperate with each other, especially older, legacy systems used in hospitals. These included sessions on FHIR®, Blockchain and its uses in healthcare, mHealth and the growing number of medical equipment, facility and resource management solutions promoting sensory information.

RSNA has been a co-sponsor of the Connectathon, along with the Health Information and Management System Society (HIMSS®) since its inception in 1999. RSNA became involved in order to contribute to the discussions around standardizing the way various healthcare information systems share information through electronic health records.

For more information, visit RSNA.org/IHE.aspx or IHEUSA.org/.