WoHIT 2011

Main goals of attending

• Improve the level of use of HL7 standards
• establish liaison with HL7 stakeholders in Europe
  • European Commission
  • goverment officials
  • EU projects
  • eHealth community
• identify opportunities for supporting HL7 activities in Europe (projects, sponsorships, subsidies, etc) (see notes 1-2)
• attract new members to HL7 International and its affiliates & facilitate creation of new affiliates (see note 3)
• confirm that HL7 standards meet European eHealth needs (note 4)

Notes:

1. EU projects if done by a project office, the HL7.nl could be used whereby the project office receives an X% of the gross revenue to compensate for its work, as well as being the legally responsible party for the project deliverables
2. Subsidies may involve contracting with a EU subsidy expert, they quite often work on a no cure, no pay basis
3. Creating new affiliates/attracting new members generates revenue for HL7 International and its affiliates. If the EU Office was instrumental in getting the affiliate up and running, it should be financially compensated by HL7 International
4. (Upstream marketing) Use questionnaires and other methods to better profile our stakeholders, to get feedback on HL7 products (as seen/perceived by stakeholders). This is feedback into the development of the global as well as the EU strategic marketing plan

Main target group

Main groups we wish to address:

• European Commission, member state government officials,eHealth community in Europe
• european/xregional eHealth projects
• EU funded projects that use HL7

This is a good fit with the attendees of HIMMS, especially if it is held in Eastern Europe. Note that this statement is based on impressions by attendees of prior WoHIT conferences, and not on analysis of attendee lists.

Message

Message we wish to convey:

• "How does HL7 support your regional/national EHR project"

Discussion: how does this message, assuming we can convey that message to all key attendees, contribute to our goals? We need to do analysis of the relationship.

Methods

Methods: How do we convey the above message? What methods do we use? What method is most fitting with the customs/sociology/culture of the target group?

• Analysis: In order to address the target group
  • we need a visible place of contact, e.g. a booth with appropriate visual material
  • ambassador talks, short testimonials would support the main message
  • a reception with VIPs
  • Most value is in one-to-one networking and conversations, we need to enable those as much as possible. Booth has associated cost, arranging one-to-one meetings can be done in rather cost effective ways. Sending invitations to attendees (sometimes this can be done via the organization if one has a certain level of sponsorship) may be an option.
  • Documentation/flyers: again a relative cheap option, we'll just have to make sure we address those issues/concerns that the target audience is facing. Its contents have to be specifically focused on the message which we wish to convey.
    • Rene: For most regional/national projects people express a need to understand the relationships between the various international standards and how these jointly provide the overall solution. In technical terms: to build an EHR and an NHIN, you need a VPN infrastructure, v3-service/message based Patient/Provider registries, IHE XDS with CDA, v2 in hospitals, IHE radiology in hospitals, v3 mesages/services for workflow support between organizations in an NHIN, a terminology server, and one will have to create implementation guides to describe how local legal issues have to be dealt with. Creating such an overall solution picture also goes to product positioning; the above would be part of my marketing pitch [not that I think these are necessarily the best solutions, they are however a good fit to describe an overall solution].

Measuring RoI

Metrics to measure success:

• Short term:
  • contact reports from face-to-face conversations with representatives from the intended target audience
  • contact list of parties potentially interested in joining HL7/ forming an affiliate
  • questionnaires assessing knowledge, usage, interests in HL7 among attendees
  • visibility in Europe (articles, media reports, etc)
  • an article in the HL7 newsletter reporting from the conference to show HL7 members how their money has been spent productively

• Medium term
  • new members leading to stronger affiliates in Europe
  • new affiliates facilitating engagement in national eHealth programs
  • new volunteers passing the word about HL7 standards
  • new liaisons with EU stakeholders
  • project scope statements for tool/standards/implementation guide developments that address HL7 needs in Europe
  • closer collaboration/coordination among affiliates
  • engagement in quality assurance work with EU projects

• Long term:
  • additional resources/revenues for HL7 as a whole (international, EU Office, EU affiliates)

References

1. eHealth Governance Initiative http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/health/policy/ehealth_governance_initiative/index_en.htm

2. eHealth Week/WoHIT http://www.worldofhealthit.org/

3. Study on eHealth standards http://www.ebusiness-watch.org/studies/special_topics/2007/documents/Special-study_01-2008_ICT_health_standards.pdf