IHE North America (NA) Connectathon Week, A Huge Success!

Dear Colleagues,

The 2025 IHE North American Connectathon Week staged and attended last week was sold out weeks before registration closed, we had to turn people away. For that we apologize, but for us it was a good problem to have. This signals to us there is a significant need for such events. The 2025 IHE North American Connectathon Week was a multi-component conference focused on Healthcare IT Interoperability. The event featured the IHE Connectathon Testing Event, Pan-Canadian Projectathon, IHE Plugathon, and Experience Days. It provided numerous opportunities for North America's digital health stakeholders to engage, validate, and refine health systems to meet the highest interoperability standards.

Highlights:

• Day 1 kicked off with Experience Days with sessions on global interoperability lessons, IHE's role in the digital health ecosystem, and Canada's national roadmap for interoperability. Also starting was the opening of the 2025 IHE Connectathon / Pan-Canadian Projectathon Testing floor, with over 23 organizations and 25 systems participating for the entire week.

• Day 2 of Experience Day featured presentations on international digital health policies, national digital health roadmaps, and the importance of IHE Connectathon testing.

• Day 3 of the 2025 Connectathon Week featured the beginning of the IHE North America Plugathon For three days, healthcare professionals, vendors, and industry experts gathered to foster innovation and knowledge sharing through interactive workshops and testing sessions across five unique tracks:
  1. Emerging IHE ProFiles
  2. IPS & Patient-Mediated Access
  3. Advancing the Pan-Canadian Shared Interoperability
  4. Taming AI with IHE Profiles
  5. Trust Frameworks and the IHE as their Technical Enablers
  • End of the Week,the 2025 IHE North America Connectathon Week became one of the largest and most significant global health IT interoperability technical testing events. Throughout the week, attendees from around the globe came together to test their interoperability readiness and participate in dynamic educational and networking opportunities.
    
    Thank you to our event partners, IHE Canada and IHE USA, and our event supporters, IHE Catalyst, IHE International, HIMSS, the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) and especially Canada Health Infoway, for helping us bring this event to Canada for the first time!
  If you were not able to attend the IHE NA Connectathon Experience Days last week, please join in the conversation and attend the upcoming webinar,
  How can IHE help with creating standards/specifications that can be utilized for jurisdictional or nationwide RFPs? and an update on 2025 IHE NA Connectathon
  
  Thursday, Feb 13, 2025, 12:00pm - 01:00pm ET
  
  Description: The Swiss Experience.
  
  eHealth Suisse, has delivered national coordination since 2008. eHealth Suisse objectives of achieving a common goal orientation of the actors, defining the concrete plan for the development and implementation of the federal eHealth strategy. eHealth Suisse also supports the Confederation and the cantons to promote the acceptance of eHealth and in communications, coordination of the actors in the care regions, together with the cantons. eHealth Suisse actively defines standards for interoperability throughout Switzerland.
  
  Join us for an informative webinar on How can IHE help with creating standards/specifications that can be utilized for jurisdictional or nationwide RFPs? and an update on 2025 IHE NA Connectathon.
  
  Speaker:
  
  Martin Smock, Dr. rer nat, scientific advisor, eHealth Suisse
  Webinar will address:
  
  Why do we use IHE Profiles for the Swiss EPR
  The role of the Swiss Projectathon
  Our plans for the future
  
  
  Register in advance for this meeting:
  
  infoway-inforoute.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0rc-CurDouGtFcm9V_JYasV7OG1wNb2mbD
  
  After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
  Don’t miss this opportunity to learn how IHE can empower eHealth initiatives, drive interoperability, and support the creation of robust RFPs for national and regional health projects.
  
  We look forward to seeing you there!
  
  Best regards,