Reflections on an Arranged Marriage between Bioinformatics and Health Informatics

Summary

Objective: To compare the discussions of two workshops held during 2001 by two Canadian organisations, HEALNet, a Network of Centres of Excellence for research in health information applications, and Genome Canada, a national research funding agency for genomics and proteomics, in collaboration with the Institute of Genetics of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, to examine strategic research development in Health Informatics and Bioinformatics respectively.

Methods: Invited workshops with structured debate. Concept analysis of preparative material and debates. Results: A predominantly common set of concepts was discerned from both workshops. Analysis of published definitions showed an inability to distinguish a definition that would suggest that health informatics and bioinformatics are separate disciplines. In both workshops there was evidence of deep concerns of identity, the lack of clear structures to support research funding as well as uncertainty in distinguishing between service and research.

Conclusions: Many deep issues currently inhibit the recognition and funding of research in health and bioinformatics in Canada and elsewhere. Some of these issues are common to both health and bioinformatics. The overlap in prevailing definitions, research concerns and methodological content in the respective domains suggest that common research needs should be better identified and reinforced for the benefit of both.

Keywords

Health informatics - bioinformatics - workshop - Canada

• References

• 1 HEALNet. 2002 http://hiru.mcmaster.ca/nce
• 2 Ecogene21. 2002 www.ecogene21.org
• 3 Genome Canada. 2002 www.genome.canada.ca
• 4 NIH Bioinformatics Definition Committee. 2002 http://grants.nih.gov/grants/bistic/CompuBioDef.pdf
• 5 Miller PL. Opportunities at the Intersection of Bioinformatics and Health Informatics. J Am Med Inform Assoc 2000; 7: 431-8.
• 6 Masys DR, Brennan PF, Ozbalt JG, Corn M, Shortliffe EH. Are medical informatics and nursing informatics the same discipline?. J Am Med Inform Assoc 2000; 7: 304-12.
• 7 American Nursing Informatics Association. 2002 www.ania.org
• 8 Joint Healthcare Information Technology Alliance (JHITA). www.jhita.org
• 9 Mayring, Philipp (2000, June). Qualitative Content Analysis. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research [Online Journal], 1 (2). http://qualitative-research.net/fqs/fqs-e/2-00inhalt-e.htm
• 10 Kohane IS. Bioinformatics and clinical informatics: the imperative to collaborate. J Am Med Inform Assoc 2000; 7 (Suppl. 05) 512-6.
• 11 Altman RB, Klein TE. Challenges for biomedical informatics and pharmacogenomics. Annual Rev Pharmacol Toxicol 2002; 42: 113-33.
• 12 Kitano H. Systems biology: a brief overview. Science 2002; 295 5560 1662-4.