HIMSS10: Fierce has you covered for the biggest HIT event of the year

The greater health IT community is gearing up for the 2010 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society conference. Like some 27,000 of you, FierceHealthIT will be descending on Atlanta this weekend.

It's an exciting time to be in this sector, slightly more than a year after passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the controversial stimulus bill, that, for better or worse, put "meaningful use" at the forefront of the health IT lexicon. A proposed CMS rule for achieving meaningful use--and thus earning federal subsidies for electronic medical records--is out, and the program is set to begin in October for hospitals and next January for office-based physicians.

Clearly, meaningful use and the stimulus will be hot topics at HIMSS10, but they aren't the only items on the jam-packed agenda. The more than 300 educational sessions planned will highlight advances in clinical-decision support, the rapid move toward wireless and mobile technologies, workforce development, health IT leadership strategies, the challenges of workflow redesign and success stories from the U.S. and abroad.

There's also the vendor exhibition that has led HIMSS to outgrow all but about five U.S. convention centers. Count on seeing nearly 900 companies and organizations showcasing their wares in the massive Georgia World Congress Center, many of which will be offering educational sessions of their own right on the show floor. Don't miss the annual Interoperability Showcase, a live demonstration of data exchange across platforms and modalities, following current standards and recommended specifications for meaningful use.

You can count on us to bring all the news to you, in FierceHealthIT, FierceMobileHealthcare and FierceEMR. Dan Bowman, Wendy Johnson and I also will be sending out live updates from HIMSS10 on our new Twitter feed, @fiercehealthit.

If you are going, though, make sure you come to our two special events. On Tuesday, March 2, FierceMobileHealthcare is joining with FierceWireless to host an executive breakfast on the topic of "Creating a Successful mHealth Initiative," from 7 to 8:15 a.m. at the Sheraton Atlanta Hotel, with free shuttle service back to the convention center. That evening at 7:30 p.m., don't miss MixIt!, our free networking party at the World of Coca-Cola.

Whether you're going to HIMSS or not, we've got you covered. - Neil

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