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AAMI UPDATE
AAMI eXchange 2022 Hints at Increasing Focus on Health IT and VR
T
he AAMI eXchange is an industry event commonly attended by medical device manufacturers and the hospital technicians who maintain those devices. This year, the event’s education sessions, expo hall floor and mainstage events all hinted at three areas of increasing interest for the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI) and the health technology space in general: data management, cybersecurity and … virtual reality?
FOCUS ON THE FUTURE: ‘HTM, I SEE YOU’ Here’s looking at you, healthcare technology management (HTM) professionals. From enhancing the patient experience to partnering with the C-suite to strengthening cybersecurity, AAMI President and CEO Pamela Arora and a panel of experts see more significant roles for HTM professionals in the future. “HTM, I see you,” said AAMI President and CEO Pamela Arora in the opening keynote at the AAMI eXchange in San Antonio, Texas. Arora shared her personal story as a breast cancer survivor who recognized HTM’s care for their support for her care providers and the equipment used in her treatment and care. Panelists cited the push toward interoperability of medical devices and
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data integration as the impetus for HTM-IT collaboration over the past decade or so. The focus is changing, but the need for HTM talent is only increasing. “Different things that only HTM can think about are really going to impact our health care system,” said Katherine Lusk, vice president of strategic partnerships at the Texas Health Services Authority. As hospitals and health care providers leverage technology to move more services into ambulatory settings, communities and homes, HTM’s expertise is vital. HTM professionals know how to support clinicians, IT specialists and patients − and they bring crucial patient safety and risk management knowledge to the table. “In many ways, HTM may be more prepared than IT at this point,” said Sue Schade, principal of StarBridge Advisors. “HTM recognized the need to integrate with IT. I’m seeing HTM initiating those partnership discussions happening already.” With new C-suite level positions, such as “chief digital health officer,” emerging, she said it is incumbent upon HTM leaders to reach out and make great partnerships. “The challenge is about taking data and really using it in clinical decision support,” said Philp Bradley, digital health strategist at HIMSS. There are still opportunities across
America to do that better in acute care settings − and new opportunities to integrate smartphones and other devices into other health care settings and into homes. For example, he said, emergency departments pride themselves on identifying sepsis, a serious condition for which early treatment improves survival rates. “What if we could use devices to monitor respiratory rate,” a symptom of sepsis, “in a patient’s home?” he asked. Monitoring such data from medical or personal devices in patient homes and on the go could improve patient outcomes, reduce clinician burden and reduce costs. But there’s a big obstacle to reaching that point: cyberattacks. “There’s been a huge change over the past 10 to 15 years,” said Kevin Fu, director of the Archimedes Center for Medical Device Security and director of medical device security at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health. It’s no longer just rogue actors carrying out such attacks. It’s nation-states with highly skilled groups wreaking havoc on hundreds of hospitals at a time. “Ten or 15 years ago, we were in more of a denial stage,” Fu said. “Now there’s recognition that that cyberattacks present real patient safety issues. Cybersecurity is a shared responsibility. It’s one thing to work on cybersecurity within hospital walls.
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