Digital Health Week 2018: ‘Transforming Healthcare through Digital Health Innovation’

The Cinnamon Grand Hotel would transform into a sea of digital health activity next week when it plays host to Digital Health Week 2018, starting October 7. The event organised by the Health Informatics Society of Sri Lanka (HISSL) and the Commonwealth Centre for Digital Health (CWCDH) is the largest Digital Health Event in the World in 2018. Over 600 delegates from over 60 countries would descend on the island from all continents of the globe for this once in a life time event.

So how did it all come about? “It was clear to me around the beginning of 2017, that Sri Lanka was ready for a major Digital Health Event. So we made a bid for the 10th Biennial Conference of the Asia Pacific Association for Medical Informatics and at the same time invited the Asia eHealth Information Network to hold its annual conference and general assembly in Sri Lanka,” explained Prof. Vajira Dissanayake, President of the HISSL and Chairman of CWCDH, in a media release.

“We were successful in the bid as well as in getting our invitation accepted. The rest is history because then everyone else wanted to come to Colombo. Of course it was not a simple thing to do, we had to travel, make our case and lobby for support. What worked in our favour was the track record that we have built over the past decade in holding major international conferences,” he added.

The event partners are the Sri Lanka Medical Association, the Commonwealth Medical Association, the Asia eHealth Information Network, and the International Medical Informatics Association.

But, the releases said, the key to success was the support of the international development partners. They included the World Health Organization, the Asian Development Bank, Path, Norad, JLN, and USAID to name a few.

The first part of the week, October 7 to 9 is devoted to the Conference on Interoperable Digital Health for Universal Health Coverage and 6th General Assembly of the Asia eHealth Information Network. This is where government officials, offi- cials of intergovernmental agencies, and officials of international development partners meet. This merges seamlessly with the 10th Biennial Conference of the Asia Pacific Association for Medical Informatics (APAMI 2018) with a gala inaugural on October 9 to 11.

In the lead up to APAMI 2018, leading academics from around the world, who are members of the International Medical Informatics Association also meet on October 8-9 for their Board and General Meetings giving a truly global dimension to the week. The week concludes on October 12 with a celebration of innovation and achievement where the joint conferences; 3rd Commonwealth Digital Health Conference and Digital Health Sri Lanka 2018, ends with the Commonwealth Digital Health Awards.

On the sidelines of all these conferences is the Commonwealth Digital Health Expo which is open to all the delegates attending the conferences.

Organising such an event would have been an enormous undertaking. Prof. Dissanayake said: “HISSL has been organizing Digital Health Conferences since the year 2010. We had major conferences in 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017. So organizing conferences is in our blood. But we must admit that we are truly exhausted this time. Organizing six conferences and an expo in one venue in one week tested us to our limits.”