The Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) offers a variety of opportunities for students to develop their professional skills, network with other health IT professionals and learn via tools that simply aren’t available anywhere else.
One unique offer designed for students comes in the form of the HIMSS Student Case Competition, sometimes known simply as “The Competition.” The contest provides teams of students an opportunity to demonstrate their health IT knowledge through the analysis of a case study provided by HIMSS.
The teams can be made up of undergraduate or graduate students, along with residents or fellows. They will be challenged to design transformative care initiatives through the lens of the case study. The analysis should demonstrate a team’s proficiency in five key areas:
- Definition of Future State – the team’s understanding of current health IT practices and perspectives across an organization and why changes need to occur. The analysis will then delve into how goals are met to ensure organizational success in the future.
- Technology – the analysis should include technology recommendations that will support transformative care measures along with justifications for that technology.
- Processes – analysis of how personnel and their workflow will be affected, as well as designs for how the future state will be achievable in the future.
- Value – this refers to an alignment of strategies measured by quality and financial metrics.
- Advocacy – defined strategies for engaging policy makers at the state and federal level which can be followed by other organizations.
Eligibility
To be eligible, teams must be comprised of no more than three members and consist of students currently enrolled in health informatics or a related healthcare discipline, regardless of full or part time status. The program must be accredited by the U.S. Department of Education or a Council for Higher Accreditation.
Participants cannot be employed by HIMSS in any way and cannot currently be serving on a HIMSS board.
Winning teams will travel to the HIMSS21 Global Conference & Exhibition in Orlando and agree to provide HIMSS with a minimum of two pieces of content, be it a blog post or interview, about the experience of the analysis and the award-winning work.
Teams will acquire experience they can add to their resumes, expand their network of health IT contacts and showcase talent from the university.
The team’s application, analysis paper and a PowerPoint slide deck that describes the analysis must be turned in by Feb. 24. For more information about the competition, the case available for study, applications for the competition, submission requirements and awards to be given, visit the HIMSS Student Case Competition page.
