At its 31st Annual Plenary and Working Group Meeting in San Diego this week, HL7 International added members to its Board of Directors and Technical Steering Committee. It also announced the 2017 HL7 Fellows and the 2017 recipients of the its Volunteer of the Year Awards.
Four members were elected or re-elected to the Board of Directors for the 2018-2019 term:
• Treasurer — Russell Leftwich, MD, senior clinical advisor for interoperability, InterSystems
• Director — Walter Suarez, MD, MPH, executive director, health IT strategy & policy, Kaiser Permanente
• Director — Jennifer Covich Bordenick, chief executive officer, eHealth Initiative
• Affiliate Director — Line Saele, chair, HL7 Norway
Four members were elected or re-elected to the HL7 Technical Steering Committee the 2018-2019 term:
• Domain Experts Steering Division — Floyd Eisenberg, MD
• Foundation and Technology Steering Division — Russell Hamm
• Structure & Semantic Design Steering Committee Division — Mary Kay McDaniel
• Technical & Support Services Steering Division — Sandra Stuart
Seven individuals were presented with the HL7 Fellow Award, which was established to recognize HL7 members with at least 15 years of active membership as well as outstanding service, commitment and contributions to HL7. The 2017 recipients of the HL7 Fellowship Award include:
• Chris Chute, MD
• Kathleen Connor
• Jane Daus
• John Hatem
• Nancy Orvis, MHA
• Craig Parker, MD
• John Ritter
• Sandra Stuart
HL7 honored three members with the 21st annual W. Edward Hammond, PhD Volunteer of the Year Award. Established in 1997, the award is named after Dr. Ed Hammond, one of HL7’s most active volunteers and a founding member as well as past Board chair. The award recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions to HL7’s success. The 2017 recipients include:
• Eric Haas, principal, Haas Consulting
• Laura Heermann Langford, RN, PhD, nursing informatics director, Intermountain Healthcare
• John Roberts, director, interoperability and standards, Tennessee Department of Health
About the Volunteers:
Eric Haas has been a member of HL7 since 2012. He actively participates in the Orders & Observations (O&O) and Public Health Work Groups. He has been instrumental in balloting the Electronic Laboratory Reporting to Public Health Release 2 (U.S. Realm) Implementation Guide for HL7’s Version 2.5.1 standard. This work resulted in a suite of laboratory guides from test compendium, through ordering, to results reporting to both the providers and public health. This provides a solid foundation to build core laboratory messaging in Version 2 for national adoption with specializations for ambulatory, public health, and soon to be followed with others.
Haas also successfully developed and balloted the HL7 Clinical Document Architecture Implementation Guide known as the Public Health Case Report, Release 2 (U.S. Realm) – the Electronic Initial Case Report. In addition, he has maintained the HL7 Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) resources for the O&O Work Group since its first release and developed the U.S. Lab FHIR profiles, based on the Version 2 guides developed in the O&O Work Group.
Laura Heermann Langford joined HL7 in 2007. As a volunteer, she co-chairs three HL7 work groups. She first began as a co-chair for the Emergency Care Work Group in 2018. Since then, she has become a co-chair for both the Patient Care (2013) and Healthcare Standards Integration (2015) Work Groups. As a clinician and in her role leading the care transitions project, Laura has actively promoted the clinical view of the impact of standards. She helps organize the Clinicians on FHIR Connectathon at the HL7 working group meetings. Finally, she plays an integral role on the planning team for the Clinical Information Interoperability Council, which is jointly sponsored by HL7 and HSPC.
John Roberts has been an HL7 member since 2001. He has served as co-chair for several work groups, including Public Health, over the years. He currently co-chairs the Templates and Learning Health Systems Work Groups. Roberts also serves as a co-chair of the Domain Experts Steering Division of HL7’s Technical Steering Committee.
