Time:              June, 22 - 24, 2010
Place:             Aalborg University, Kroghstræde 3, room 3.104
Deadline:        June 6^th 2010
Please register here

Title: Socio-technical Approaches to Health Care IT research.

Organiser:    
Professor Christian Nøhr,  cn@plan.aau.dk    
Dr. Jos Aarts, Senior Research Scientist, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Faculty:         
Professor Ross Koppel, Sociology Department, University of Pennsylvania i USA.
Professor Paul Turner, University of Tasmania, Australia.
Professor Judith Gregory, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA.
Professor Andre Kushniruk, University of Victoria, BC, Canada.
Ass. Professor Elizabeth Borycki, University of Victoria, BC, Canada.

ECTS: 2 ECTS (to be awarded on the condition of submission of research questions, and active  participation in the course and the ITHC conference http://www.ithc2010.org )

Description:

A number of recent studies on health informatics implementation have applied a socio-technical approach to gain a deeper understanding of the implementation processes and have reached a level where this approach is moving from being predominantly analytical to being more proactively prescribing.

The objective of the course is to introduce and discuss important theoretical approaches to analysis, design and implementation processes of health informatics systems and assess empirical evidence. The course precedes the international conference “ITHC 2010” with the theme “Designing and Implementing Health IT: from safe systems to patient safety”. The conference will in particular discuss the following questions:

1. How are the mutual adaptations of technology and work practice during implementation reflected in design and redesign?
2. How are the successful implementations carried out as a process of organizational change?
3. How does a socio-technical understanding improves the design and implementation of safe systems and thus contributes to the agenda of patient safety?

The course is scheduled for the day before the international conference. In the morning the faculty will lecture on topics of their recent research and in the afternoon the PhD. students will present their research and get feedback from the international faculty.

The PhD students will be asked to be prepared by reading the course material put together by the faculty and in addition to submit a two-page description of their research as well as presenting their research questions at the course.