Toronto,  July 20, 2017 –  Andre Kushniruk, Director and Professor, School of Health Information Science, University of Victoria, has been selected to replace Dr. Jermey Theal as Vice-President, North America and COACH Representative to IMIA (the International Medical Informatics Association).

“I am grateful to Dr. Theal for his service as IMIA Rep,” said COACH CEO Mark Casselman. “It’s important that we continue to build relationships and exchange knowledge with the international Health Informatics community. We are fortunate to have someone of the calibre of Dr. Kushniruk stepping into this crucial role.”

Dr. Kushniruk brings experience with a range of organizations and countries (including Canada, the US, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Germany, France, the UK, Hong Kong, Japan, and Australia) and is a founding member of the International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics (IAHSI). Dr. Kushniruk served as co-chair of the IMIA Human Factors working group, is a member of the IMIA patient safety working group, and also served as the track chair in human factors for the Copenhagen Medinfo 2013 conference.

IMIA is the world body for health and biomedical informatics. IMIA provides leadership and expertise to the multidisciplinary health-focused community and to policy makers, to enable the transformation of healthcare in accord with the world-wide vision of improving the health of the world population using technology. Inherent in IMIA’s role is to bring together, from a global perspective, scientists, researchers, users, vendors, developers, consultants and suppliers in an environment of co-operation and sharing. IMIA has particular strength in promoting and developing health / biomedical informatics academic research across the world. It organizes and holds an international conference every two years, called MedInfo, which brings together the best and brightest in the academic pursuit of scholarly work in health / biomedical informatics.

COACH: Canada’s Health Informatics Association connects, inspires, and educates the digital health professionals creating the future of health in Canada. Our members are a diverse community of accomplished, influential professionals working to make a difference in advancing healthcare through information technology. COACH fosters network growth and connection; brings together ideas from multiple segments for incubation and advocacy; supports members through professional development at the individual and organizational level; and advocates for the Canadian digital health industry.