UM-IHC Hosts Its Inaugural Lunch Lecture and Networking Event
On September 30, 2024, the University of Maryland Institute for Health Computing (UM-IHC) hosted its inaugural lunch lecture and networking event at its headquarters in North Bethesda. Dr. Charles Sneiderman, M.D., Ph.D., spoke on the history of health computing, with an emphasis on Montgomery County’s role.
Sneiderman, who received his bachelor’s degree in zoology in 1969 from the University of Maryland, College Park, retired in 2010 after a 31-year career in medical informatics at the Lister Hill National Center for Biomedical Communications, National Library of Medicine (NLM) and the National Institutes of Health. Since leaving federal service, he developed a computerized clinical decision support system to assist primary health care practices in recognizing and managing post-traumatic stress syndromes with support from the NLM Disaster Information Management Research Center. He currently serves as volunteer medical director with the Culmore Clinic in Northern Virginia.
“Dr. Sneiderman’s firsthand experience provided deep background on the development of health computing in our region,” said UM-IHC Co-Executive Director Adam Porter, a professor of computer science at UMCP. “This is the first of a continuing lecture series in which IHC researchers and other experts will share much-needed technical information with our local bio, health and life sciences practitioners.”
“It is an honor to have Dr. Charles Sneiderman discuss the origins of the National Library of Medicine, which in many ways pioneered a path forward to present-day clinical informatics,” said UM-IHC Co-Executive Director Bradley Maron, a professor of medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “It is remarkable to consider the innovative mindset that defined that era, but it is also an inspiration to be bold in our thinking here at UM-IHC.”