boston area informatics folks--informational interview with excited newbie?

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Wow, am I ever excited to have found that there's such a thing as nursing informatics!

I quit nursing for all the usual reasons in 1985--really, nothing has changed--and became a medical book editor, then a managing editor for a medical publication, and then a software technical writer. Whilst investigating yet another career change, I stumbled on this!

I think this could be a great fit for me--I have clinical experience, I know lots of medical science, I can program with beginner proficiency, I know a lot about the software development process, I know how to work with engineers and geeks and even like it, I have intermediate knowledge of lots of platforms, languages, and tools, I'm proficient in HTML, I have project management experience, I've taken an algorithms class, and, oh yeah, I can document anything for any audience.... I'm guessing these are all directly relevant.

Are there any nursing informatics people in the Boston area who'd be willing to have a short conversation with me about the field--opportunities, getting started, meetings to attend?

(I've already scoped out the AMIA and ANIA sites and local meetings.)

Cheers!

Becky

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Specializes in Informatics, Education, and Oncology.

I'd definately agree that a needed skill set for this specialty would include excellent communication skills and previous clincial experience along with a comfort level and knowledge of systems fundamentals. Project Management skills would be a plus but dependent on the specific role one held.

Software development and experience with a full system life cycle would come in handy if you work in development for a vendor or implementation for anyone.

You do not have to have any programming skills unless you want to write code for a vendor.............I take that back there are a few old school hospital IT/IS depts that still have in house programmers but thats few and far between and is NOT the norm geographically or industry wide.

I'd suggest contacting a BANIC (Boston Area Nursing Informatics Consortium) member or even a CARING (Capital Area Roundtable in Nursing Informatics) member located in Boston. Feel free to e-mail me off line and I can get you a contact name/number.

Good Luck and glad to see you have found your 3rd, 4th calling/career.

>

Wow, am I ever excited to have found that there's such a thing as nursing informatics!

I quit nursing for all the usual reasons in 1985--really, nothing has changed--and became a medical book editor, then a managing editor for a medical publication, and then a software technical writer. Whilst investigating yet another career change, I stumbled on this!

I think this could be a great fit for me--I have clinical experience, I know lots of medical science, I can program with beginner proficiency, I know a lot about the software development process, I know how to work with engineers and geeks and even like it, I have intermediate knowledge of lots of platforms, languages, and tools, I'm proficient in HTML, I have project management experience, I've taken an algorithms class, and, oh yeah, I can document anything for any audience.... I'm guessing these are all directly relevant.

Are there any nursing informatics people in the Boston area who'd be willing to have a short conversation with me about the field--opportunities, getting started, meetings to attend?

(I've already scoped out the AMIA and ANIA sites and local meetings.)

Cheers!

Becky

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Thanks for your reply, RNinformatics. I can't find the email icon anywhere in either your post or your profile. Could that be because I'm very new and haven't posted 15 times yet?

thanks!

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Specializes in Informatics, Med/Surg.

The Boston Area Nursing Informatics group is at www.nenic.org BANIC and NISNE have merged into this new organization.

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