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Interview with Dr. Shannon

If you missed Dr. Shannon's recorded lecture we are publishing it here so you could see it.   Considering other recorded lectures please be patient.  When we will get them, first what we have to do is  upload them on Youtube and than we will share them with you. 


Dr. Shannon could not make it to the convention due to his obligations. Despite that he was so kind and  recorded lecture for the convention in advance. 


So, here is the lecture. 



We also bring you an interview with Dr. Shannon.  Before the interview we would like to highlight that Dr. Shannon is not only a great expert, he is also  very approachable person and we are proud for establishing  connection with him. It was a great honour to talk with him. We also hope that we will stay in touch.  As you are all aware, adoption of FLOSS is not easy and we need as many experts of his profile as possible. 


You can see Dr. Shannon's CV at the end of a Program DC2012 page (pdf files)


Interview with Dr. Tony Shannon


1. As we saw in your lecture, you are currently working as an emergency physician in Leeds Teaching Hospital. However, you also have a role as a Clinical Lead for Informatics in this hospital which is by the way one of the largest in the UK. We do not see that many doctors getting involved with informatics on such a high level. 

Could you tell us a bit more about your position as a Clinical Lead for Informatics?


Dr. Shannon: Appointed > 2 years ago as I left NHS Connecting for Health. I help to oversee the Informatics Strategy here at Leeds Hospitals. 


2. In Leeds you are developing a clinical portal as a joint open source effort between your department and a commercial partner.

 Can you tell us more about your in-house informatics department and the process of working with a commercial partner on an open source project?

Dr. Shannon: Small team that combines NHS hospital staff, University team and small business spinoff.. team of about 4-6 involved. 


3. Is all the code you develop for the clinical portal published openly? Can for example developers from Croatia contribute to it?

 

Dr. Shannon: Yes, here is the code from an earlier release.. needs updating but at least is in the open.

http://forge.tactix4.net/gf/project/ocp_client/

 
4. Health systems are as you said very complex, but also the ones which can probably benefit most from information technology. This unfortunately has not happened so far. You certainly believe that collaboration and innovation through open source projects holds the key to improving healthcare. 

What are the major threats of such an approach?

Dr. Shannon: Vested interests from IT industry will try to get in the way. Lack of educated physicians and managers will perpetuate the current situation.

 

5. Considering open standards and open source innovations in health care what is the exact interest of hospitals/doctors in this kind of an approach?

Dr. Shannon: To allow them to get involved and shape the solutions that they use in their work.


6. Have doctors/hospitals from around the globe contacted you or you contacted them? What was their reaction ?


Dr. Shannon:  I have shared the story in a few ways online etc, at presentations. Generally I get much less interest than I expect.   
7.  Healthcare system in Croatia is fairly similar to the one in UK. We also have a publicly funded healthcare system, which is however numerous times smaller than yours.

Can you share some last advice for advancement of healthcare IT in Croatia, some key lessons you learned along the way? 

Dr. Shannon: Tackle people (clinical leadership), process (eg Lean thinking) and Technology (esp open source) together.