The Eleventh Annual European interoperability testing event, known as the IHE Connectathon, will be held in Pisa, Italy from April 11 to 15, 2011 at the Stazione Leopolda, a former railway station transformed into a magnificent multifunctional centre ideally suited as a venue for this pan-European gathering.
More than 200 information technology engineers from 90 companies are expected for this year’s event, an intensive, five-day ‘connectivity marathon’ for testing the interoperability of applications used in health information systems.
In the framework of the annual Connectathon a parallel interoperability testing event, called a Projectathon, will be organised by the epSOS project (Smart Open Services for European Patients), as part of the large-scale European pilot program for the cross-border exchange of patient summaries and electronic prescriptions.
In parallel with these testing activities, Connectathon 2011 will offer a conference program of workshops and seminars gathering key stakeholders from diverse European health IT programs for a focus on specific healthcare themes.
At the IHE Connectathon all companies implementing IHE Technical Framework specifications in their products have a unique opportunity to test their applications with systems and products from other vendors in a real-time interoperability environment.
According to vendors who have participated in previous Connectathons, “the cost of identifying and solving a bug during a Connectathon is about 10 times less than the cost of a bug identified on site.”
“After 10 years of steady progress, Connectathon is now seen as the right place at the right moment for people to share experiences on e-health implementations,” according to Peter Kuenecke, IHE-Europe vendor Co-Chair.
The results of the Connectathon will be published on the IHE-Europe website and application vendors may refer to the IHE Integration Statements to show compliance of their products with IHE Integration Profiles. This is a clear benefit to vendors when responding to Requests for Proposals from users.
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