Healthcare as a Startup

What I Loved & Didn’t at HIMSS ’09

April 9, 2009 at 12:20 pm Justin Wilcox 1 comment

Quick list of things I loved about HIMSS ’09, things I was thoroughly disappointed by, and simple suggestions to HIMSS leadership to address the latter for HIMSS ’10.

Things I Loved about HIMSS 09:

1. The people. On the bus, on the plane, at a bar, wherever. HIMSS attendees are smart, passionate people looking to make the best of a broken system. Every chance I got to talk with a HIMSS attendee, whether it was about healthcare, or social media, or the local bar scene, it was an opportunity and a pleasure.
2. Networking. The special interest group meetings ,”Meet the Bloggers” panel discussion, and the Communities Open House were all terrific places to meet people and make great connections.
3. Wi-Fi access during educational sessions. 80% of the educational sessions I attended didn’t require my full attention, which wasn’t a bad thing. In fact, those sessions gave me a chance to multi-task (checking email, Tweeting, etc.) thanks to the almost ubiquitous internet access available onsite.
4. HIMSS staff. I can personally attest to the fact that the HIMSS staff works extremely hard for their members and it shows. Whether it was Yvonne helping me get to the convention, Cesar & Ward injecting some much needed passion, or whoever arranged for the Metra passes and the shuttle busses back to the airport, I was consistently surprised by the effort HIMSS staff put into making HIMSS 09 a terrific event for its members.

Things I Didn’t Love about HIMSS 09

1. Awful software. I can’t tell you how unacceptable it is that HIMSS doesn’t follow best practices when it comes to security in their own  software. Emailing passwords, sending them unencrypted over the wire, leaving them plain text in the database – disgraceful is an understatement. 10-to-1 there are sql-injection and xss vulnerabilities as well. There’s really no excuse for the organization that represents the HIT community to be condoning this kind of software engineering, especially when security must be at the core of everything we do.
2. Massive waste. Wanna see what it looks like when you waste $20+ million*? Walk the exhibitor floor at a HIMSS conference. Who do you think ends up paying for the double-decker booths, that 6,000 sq. ft. open bar, and those rotating wastes of PVC & nylon hanging from the ceiling? If HIT vendor shareholders saw how their money was being spent, I think we’d see a lot more intelligent use of marketing $.
3. Massive waste #2. Junk mail? Seriously? Designing, printing, and mailing your flyers only so they could end up in someone else’s recycle bin (I hope)…poor choice. Marketing by yelling is a waste of all of our time, money & resources.

* SWAG.

HIMSS Action Items for 2010

1. Don’t make bad software. Or at least don’t release it. It’s really not hard to fix your software from a security standpoint – 4 hours tops (see the email I sent to you last month). That’s not the biggest problem here though. You clearly don’t understand how important it is for you, the organization that epitomizes the HIT community, to not only provide information on security best practices, but to embody them yourself. Everyone who uses your apps and writes software thought to themselves for a split-second, “Well if HIMSS can send passwords over email…” Don’t perpetuate the software practices that have gotten us where we are today – show your constituents the right way to build software, or don’t write it at all.
2. Make an opt-out list for unsolicited snail mail. When we register for HIMSS ’10, please give us a checkbox to opt-out of the shiny pre-conference post cards. Saves us time, saves a little bit of the planet, and save vendors money.

Overall, especially when I consider the massive scale of HIMSS ’09, I consider it a rousing success.  While every organization has things it can do to improve, the conference provided terrific opportunities to learn new things and meet new people.  I’m definitely looking forward to 2010 in Atlanta, especially if we can rectify some of the ’09 issues.

Your turn. What did you love & hate? 10  points for each relevant item – 20 points for getting me to change my mind on any of the above.

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