The use of ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) in Healthcare Services is the main mechanism to improve efficiency and effectiveness. Nowadays ICTs are being developed to achieve the following objectives:
– To integrate heterogeneous systems;
– To develop frameworks to make all data meaningful, accessible and available everywhere and permanently;
– To develop AIDC (Automatic Identification and Data Collectors) systems;
– To develop intelligent systems to support clinical and management decisions;

The use of these technologies also improves the quality of patient care and reduces clinical risk. At the same time, the patient will be part of the healthcare process, having more information about diseases and access to his/her electronic health record.

The physicians will have more information to deliver a better service and dynamic guidelines to improve quality and reduce risks. The pharmaceutical industries can get more and more accurate information about drug´s effects and supply chain delivery systems. Public health authorities can get more accurate information and develop dashboards to make better decisions. Hospital Management benefits from a more updated meaningful data. This data is used by management systems to delivery KPI (Key Performance Indicators).

This conference aims to draw together information systems, practitioners and management experts from all quadrants involved in developing computer technology to improve healthcare quality.

Main areas and topics:

A. Research Issues
– Computers and Primary Care
– Clinical Data Visualisation Standards
– e-Health Architectures
– Healthcare Data Architecture and Terminology Standards
– Federated Electronic Health Records
– Personalized Medicine
– Health Informatics and Education
– Human Computer Interaction
– Infrastructure and Architecture
– Internet and Medicine
– Interoperability issues
– IT and Patient Care
– Nursing Informatics
– RFID and localization techniques
– Usability and Ubiquity in e-Health
– e-Health Virtual Communities
– Business Process Management Systems
– Second Life for Healthcare Support and Education 	

B. Management Issues
– Case Studies
– Management Change
– Confidentiality and Privacy
– e-Health Collaborative Strategies and Techniques
– e-Training
– Healthcare Management Dashboards
– Legal issues
– Balanced scorecards models to improve Hospital Performance and Productivity
– Business Intelligence in Healthcare
– e-Health to improve Healthcare Quality and Patient Safety.
– Healthcare Information Systems Regulatory issues
– Security in e-Health
– Service Models
– Social implications
– Stakeholders involvement

C. Applications
– Clinical Information Systems
– Data Mining and Clinical Studies
– Medical Guidelines
– e-Health Decision Support Systems
– e-Logistics and e-Pharmacy
– Intelligent Medical Systems
– Mobile Applications
– Patient Electronic Health Records
– Healthcare Portals to inform and connect Patients with Physicians
– Patients and Public Health
– Social Networks in Healthcare contexts
– e-Health Marketing
– e-Procurement and e-Commerce
– Telemedicine
– Automatic Identification and Data Collector Systems
– Unified data processing and communication Systems
– Web Based Applications
– e-Health 2.0