MLA Medical Informatics Section
Annual Business Meeting Minutes 2005

Wednesday, May 18
12:30-2:30
San Antonio

Welcome/Introductions
The meeting was called to order at 12:35 p.m. by the Chair of the Section, Beth Layton. She introduced Catherine Arnott Smith the incoming Chair. Colleen Cuddy (incoming Secretary/Treasurer) took minutes for Taneya Koonce. Thirty-one members were present for the meeting:

Review of the 2004 Business Meeting minutes
As the minutes from 2004 were not available to review at the meeting, members were asked to review the 2004 minutes online and send any comments to the Chair. Minutes from the 2005 meeting will be emailed to those present for review as well. [Through the listserv, Beth Layton asked attendees to comment on the 2004 minutes and no changes were needed.] The minutes were accepted.

A change in the order of reports was established:

Secretary/Treasurer Report- Taneya Koonce
This report was not available. Beth will forward the report to the membership once she receives it.

Nominating Committee/Election - Nancy Allee
Nancy reported that an election was successfully held in April. Forty-seven votes were cast. Nancy thanked the committee members who had worked with her: Kris Alpi, Ione Auston; Marcus Banks; Beth Layton (ex officio); and Brenda Seago.

The elected officers are:
" Chair-elect 2005-06/Chair 2006-07: Kathy Kerdolff
" Section Council Representative-elect 2005-06/Section Council Representative 2006-08: Susan Lessick
" Secretary/Treasurer 2005-07: Colleen Cuddy
" Nominating Committee Chair, Nancy Allee

Beth read a brief statement from Kathy Kerdolff, who was unable to attend the meeting.

Bylaws Committee Chair, Colleen Cuddy
There were no changes to the sections bylaws during the 2004-2005 year and nothing to report.

Membership Committee - Mike Kronenfeld
Mike encouraged membership to subscribe to the listserv devoted to MLA business. He noted that brochures were being distributed at the Section Council table.

Section Council - Joan Gregory (for Patricia Weiss)
A list of candidates was circulated for the MLA nominating committee and those present were asked to indicate their choice.

Highlights of the Section Council Report include:

" There is a new deadline of February 15th for section elections
" MLA members can enroll in additional sections free of charge until the next MLA billing cycle.
" Next year at MLA, Susan and Joan Gregory will attend the NPC '07 and Catharine or Kathy will attend Section Council.
" If the section would like a Board member to attend the annual business meeting at 2006 the section will need to let the Board know by September 1st.
" Email voting has been approved by the Board.
" Joan Gregory needs to report back on the history of the MIS quilt square. Rikke will email information to Joan.
" Section Council requested information about standards that the sections have developed. Joan will send the wording from Section Council to Beth who will draft an email to query all section members. Once the information is compiled it will be put on the MIS Web site.
" Section Council wanted input on section programming at the meeting. Overall the programming was well received.
" There is a renewed interest in international initiatives. The Section Council would like to know about our involvement with any international groups. See #5 of the Chair's report-Intl Journal Club.

Program Chair - Catherine Arnott Smith

Section Programming at MLA 2005:

1. Reaching Out to All at All Points of Care or Need. Co-sponsored with Consumer and Patient Health Information, Corporate Information Services, Dental, Pharmacy and Drug Information, Public Health/Health Administration, Public Services, and Research Sections. Monday, May 16, 2:30-4:00 PM. Conference Center: River 007AB.

2. Serving Diverse Information Needs for Clinical Practice and Research. Co-sponsored with Pharmacy and Drug Information Section, and Molecular Biology and Genomics SIG. Tuesday, May 17, 2:30-4:00 PM. Conference Center: River 006B.

3. Medical Information Diversity: Results of an MLA Survey. Cosponsored with Technical Services and Medical Library Education Sections. Wednesday, May 18, 2:30-4:00 PM. Conference Center: River 008B.

Programming ideas for 2006:

" Dental informatics with Dental Section as Primary
" Taxonomies with Bioinformatics group
" With MLES contributed papers on tools and modes to support CE for medical informatics/librarianship
" EDtech MIS/Secondary
" Public Health Data Library/Informatics/GIS
" Interactive Journals

Classes and/or symposiums for 2007 prior to January 2006.

Beth Layton reported that the National Programming Committee is encouraging sections to focus on Native American and non-traditional medicine contrasted with new technologies. This is a way of celebrating the Phoenix area, past and present.

Catherine will email membership with the ideas generated for feedback.

Website Editor - Nic Cecchino
Nic Cecchino re-designed the web site in the past year.

Professional Development Liaison - Lisa K. Traditi
Highlights of the Report include:
" There is a new CE brochure
" Journal clubs are now called discussion groups
" Independent Reading Program available
" Educational Clearing House Revision (10 WBL courses)
" Members receive AHIP points for mentoring
" Consumer Health Certification being examined

There was a discussion of possible CE programming that would be of interest to members including a mini Woods Hole course and a project management course. Catherine will poll section members to see what their interests are.

A discussion of a blog for the Journal Club/Discussion Group was discussed. Stephen MacCull volunteered to move the initiative forward. This supports the international goals since location is less of an issue with a blog.

Government Relations Liaison - Brenda L. Seago
Brenda reported that she will filter action items to the MIS listserv based on relevance.

Career Development Award - Beth Layton
The section continues to provide funding for the Medical Informatics Section/MLA Career Development Grant. Two awards of $1500 each can be given and the section fully funds these career development grants. The MIS/MLA Career Development Grant was awarded to Ruiling Guo, AHIP, Idaho Health Sciences Library, Idaho State University-Pocatello, and Christine F. Marton, College of Information Studies University of British Columbia-Vancouver, Canada.
The MLA Awards Committee vets candidates for these awards.

Chair - Beth Layton
Beth referred to the Section Annual Report located at http://www.medinfo.mlanet.org/ARCH_ANNRpt/AnnRep0405.html.

New Business
Lindberg Scholarship - It was determined that the MIS would give a donation of $2000.

Updating of Medical Informatics Section: Self-Education Resources Project at http://www.medinfo.mlanet.org/self_ed.html. Kris Alpi suggested that the usage statistics could be used to determine how much use it gets. Christine Morton volunteered to work on this project.

Joint MIS/Bio reception was not as well attended as in past most likely due to scheduling. It was determined that it would be better to hold the reception on another evening with less conflict.

Laura Barrett is MLA representative to AMIA. She is investigating a possible one-day IAMS consortia meeting to be held in Phoenix as AMIA meets just prior to MLA.

The meeting was adjourned at 2:05 p.m.

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