INTRODUCTION TO MEDICAL
INFORMATICS
DR. ALI M. HADIANFARD
FACULTY MEMBER OF AJUMS
http://www.alihadianfard.info/download.html
Further reading
• Biomedical informatics computer applications in health care and biomedicine (3rd
edition), Edward H. Shortliffe, 2006 (chapter 1).
• ABC of health informatics, Frank Sullivan and Jeremy C Wyatt, 2006 (chapter 1).
• Informatics for healthcare professionals, Kathleen M. Young, 2000 (chapters 1
and 2).
What is Informatics?
In 1968, the term “Informatics” was used to indicate that a
vast volume of information can be managed through
computer technology
Information Management
The process of creating/gathering, storing, finding/retrieving,
manipulating/analyzing/interpreting, displaying, and sharing
information
Informatics is made up of the elements of Data,
Information, and Knowledge
What is Medical Informatics?
This term was coined in the mid-1970s. It comes from the French expression ‘informatique Médicale’
The study of applying computer technology to manage medical information in order to affect
medical care and support problem-solving and decision-making
Medical informatics as an interdisciplinary scientific field includes:
Computer science;
Health care science;
Information science;
and Cognitive science
A multidisciplinary domain including cognitive
psychology,
artificial intelligence, neuroscience, linguistics,
anthropology, and philosophy to develop
theories about human perception, thinking, and
learning
Can be considered as the cognitive process (
the thought process) selecting a logical choice
from the available alternatives.
Health Informatics
the terms:
“Health Informatics”;
“Health Care Informatics”;
and “Clinical Informatics” are very popular.
It seems that regardless of the difference between medical and health terms, these terms to be
synonymous and exchangeable with Medical Informatics
Earlier terms (not common):
Medical Computing
Medical Information Science
Medical Informatics domain
 Electronic Health Record (including Expert Systems and Clinical Decision Support Systems)
 Medical Imaging Processing
 Hospital (Health) Information Systems
 Telemedicine
 Consumer Health Informatics (The study, implementation, and development of computers and telecommunications to support
consumers in obtaining information, analyzing their unique health care needs and helping them make decisions about their own
health)
 Discipline Informatics (such as Nursing Informatics, Dental Informatics, Nutrition Informatics, pharmacy informatics, and so on)
 Information Retrieval Systems
 Evidence-based Medicine
 Clinical Research Informatics
 Medical Education (including Patient Education)
Biomedicine
Biomedicine is also known as Biomedical Informatics is a wide-ranging term that
encompasses the Bioinformatics domain and the Medical Informatics field
Bioinformatics demonstrates the combination of biology (including human genetics)
and information technology
Biomedical Engineering indicates the hardware aspect of medicine and focuses on
applying computer technology in medical devices
Relationship between the terms
Area
Molecular and
cellular processes
Bioinforma
tics
Imaging
informatics
Tissues and organs
Biomedical Informatics
Clinical
informatics
Public
health
informatics
Individuals
(patients)
Populations and
society
Some Journals on medical Informatics
• Journal of The American Medical Informatics Association
• BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making
• Methods of Information in Medicine
• Artificial Intelligence in Medicine
Associations on medical Informatics
• AMIA - American Medical Informatics Association
• IMIA - International Medical Informatics Association
• HIMSS - Health Information Management Systems Society
• AMDIS - Association of Medical Director of Information Systems
• AHIMA - American Health Information Management Association
• E-health Initiative
• Medical Library Association
• NLM - National Library of Medicine
What do you
think?
Is there any difference between
health information management
and medical informatics?