Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BHSMI), in cooperation with Italian Association of Telemedicine and Medical Informatics (@ITIM), organizes the Special Track of MIE 2009 on the following topic:

E-health and Telemedicine to Support Scientific Cooperation Between Adriatic and Balkan countries

BHSMI Special Track will take place on Sunday, August 30th, from 9:00-17:00, at the main venue of MIE 2009 (Hotel Holiday Inn).

Programme of the Special Track is available as part of MIE 2009 Programme (download here or from www.mie2009.org).

During last week in August of the year 2008 Sarajevo visited Jacob Hofdijk, PhD, president of the European Federation for Medical Informatics - EFMI. On that occasion he held promotional speech at the "Radon Plaza" Hotel in relation to the upcoming organization of the XXII European Congress of Medical Informatics - MIE 2009. During his visit in Sarajevo was also organized the Second Congress of Scientist from Bosnia and Herzegovina and the World. Mr. Hofdijk had the opportunity to meet highest political officials: President of the B&H Presidency, Haris Silajdžić, Minister of Science and Education, Meliha Alić, Prime Minister of the Canton Sarajevo Samir Silajdžić, Minister of Science and Education of Canton Sarajevo, Safet Kešo, President of the Canton Sarajevo Assembly Denis Zvizdić, President of the Academy of Arts and Science of B&H, academician Božo Matić and many other important persons from Sarajevo and B&H. Also, Jacob Hofdijk, together with the Rector of the Sarajevo University professor Faruk Čaklovica and the President of LOC MIE 2009, professor Izet Mašić attended official reception at the Sarajevo Mayor office Ms. Semiha Borovac, on which occasion he received the "Sarajevo City Charter". Jacob Hofdijk with the director of the Agency "Promotours", Ismet Sijerčić, Mr. Sabit Subašić, Information officer from Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the director of the Olympic center "Skenderija" visited congress capacities at Skenderija, as possible location for upcoming MIE 2009 in Sarajevo. Also he visited several hotels and restaurants planned to accommodate participants of the MIE 2009, and organize diner and cultural events during the Congress. He also had the opportunity to test the food and beverages that will be offered to the participants of the Congress. President of EFMI, Mr Jacob Hofdijk give interviews to the journalists of several TV stations with which he promoted the MIE 2009 conference.

At MIE2008 conference in Gothenburg BHSMI was represented by president of BHSMI and LOC of MIE2009, Prof. Izet Masic (imasic@lol.ba) and Vice-president, Dr. Almir Dzananovic (almircic@yahoo.com), where they presented posters about History of Medical informatics in Bosnia & Herzegovina and MIE 2009 conference, which will be held in Sarajevo in August next year. At EFMI Council meeting prof. Izet Masic reported to the EFMI Council members last activities about organization of MIE2009 conference in Sarajevo. Prof. Klaus-Peter Adlassnig, as chair of Scientific Program Committee, reported about future activities and schedule of the scientific part of MIE2009 conference. Also, Masic and Dzananovic distributed new published promo materials of the MIE2009 conference.

Board members of Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina authorized Prof Izet Masic to attend meeting in Vienna and discus issues related to the scientific part of the EFMI2009 with Prof Adlassnig. Besides Prof Klaus-Peter Adlassnig, the chair of the Scientific Program Committee and Prof Izet Masic chair of Local Organising Committee, at the meeting at Medical University of Vienna held on 5 May 2008 were present Prof Jacob Hofdijk and Andrea Rappelsberger, secretary. In order to prepare EFMI2009 in the most professional manner meeting participants talk on arrangements as time schedule - timeline, number of sessions, chairpersons, plenary sessions and invited speakers. For submission and review of papers the existing software will be used. Also, numbers of other interesting subjects for MIE2009 were discussed: EFMI Council should nominate Prof Blobel and Prof Mantas to be in-charge for EFMI working groups and for tutorials. Prof Masic had the following suggestions:

• Congress participants from South-eastern Europe and from ex-Soviet Union countries should have privileged status related to congress fees and other costs;
• Due to practical reasons MIE2009 proceedings should be printed out in Sarajevo as per IOS Press standards and with IOS Press logo;
• One day of the congress should be dedicated to medical students.

This important progress of the vital aspect of MIE2009 will be reported during the Council Meeting on 24 May 2008, during the MIE2008 conference in Gothenburg by Prof. Adlassnig and Prof. Masic.

Next year, in the period from 30 August to 2 September will be held the 22nd International Congress of the European Federation for Medical Informatics, MIE2009. Members of the Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) - Society for Medical Informatics (SMI) and members of the Local Organising Committee (LOC) have big responsibility to prepare everything for the most important gathering for medical informatics family. Everybody in BiHSMI is aware that as soon as 21st congress – EFMI in Gothenburg is closed, Sarajevo – MIE2009 is open. This is short overview of the activities performed by BiHSMI in order to, as better as possible, prepare organisation of this event. Not to be mention huge commitment of the BiH LOC members.

• Beside regular meetings held monthly, first Saturday in a month, we have meetings to discuss all necessary actions for MIE2009. On the first BiHSMI meeting this year members voted for the new BiHSMI Board and results of elections were as follows (Members of BiHSMI Board and Management Board):
• By end of March or begging of April 2008 Sarajevo will visit distinguished guests from IMIA and EFMI: Jacob Hofdijk, Klaus-Peter Adlassnig and John Mantas. In the same period will be organised one day conference to celebrate jubilee of 20 years of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) - Society for Medical Informatics (SMI). Also, our guests will visit BiH presidency and have meeting with BiH president, Mr. Haris Silajdzic. As one of the organisations which supports organisation of MIE2009 is University of Sarajevo. Meeting is scheduled with Prof. Faruk Caklovica rector of University of Sarajevo and Zoran Seleskovic, secretary.
• Nomination process for LOC and Scientific Committee is finished and we can go ahead and prepare 1000 flyers to be distributed at MIE2008 in Gothenburg. MIE2008 participants from Bosnia and Herzegovina will bring promotional material and slide show to be presented at Gothenburg Theatre. In the Sarajevo delegation will be representatives form City of Sarajevo, Tourist community and BHSMI.
• Representatives for BHSMI attended all important congresses, symposiums and conferences related to medical informatics and e-Health, and also present with oral and poster presentations.
• International Conference Rosenberg Germany, 2-5 December 2007
• ISfTeH International Conference, Chennai India, 2-3 November 2007
• 12th World Congress on Health Informatics (MEDINFO), Brisbane Australia, 20-24 August 2007, Building sustainable health systems”

The Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina (www.bhsmi.ba) organized its tenth jubilee scientific assembly in Sarajevo on 20 December 2005. Special Topic Conference under the title eHealth and eEducation was organized in cooperation with International Society for Telemedicine & eHealth (www.isft.net), University of Sarajevo (www.unsa.ba) and Ericsson (www.ericsson.com).

This year, Special topic conference was dedicated to the topic „eHealth and eEducation“. First of all, more than five years of the leading world governmental and the nongovernmental organizations have been developing the projects of the globalization of the electronic health (Global eHealth) and mass use of Internet as global world communication network in the distribution of the medical knowledge through the biomedical hosts – data bases, which enable the free approach to the medical (health) information. In the same time, the leading world companies which produce the software packages and create own data bases for the separate segments and activities in the field of health, mainly the commercial ones, distribute demo-versions of those packages by Internet in the purpose of their affirmation and purchase. Furthermore, the Society for the Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina, thank to the project of Distance learning in biomedicine, realized in the last four years at the Medical Faculty in Sarajevo, and extended for the next two years, has affirmed with the performance of our experts on three scientific assemblies which organized the World Association for Telemedicine and eHealth (International Society for Telemedicine and eHealth – IsfTeH), currently chaired by prof Michael Nierlich, from the Medical Faculty in Regensburg (Germany). This year Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina became also the official member of this scientific association.

The affirmed company Ericsson is among the first ones who recognized the interest in this field and expressed its desire to get involved, more actively, in the creation of the strategic and practical solutions in the field of eHealth and eEducation, what BH Society for Medical Informatics has accepted as an idea and important step and also our experts get involved actively in the creation of the future solutions of information of health system and its subsystems, as well as in the educational system in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

After welcome speeches and congratulation letter sent by prof Michael Nierlich chairman of the International Society for Telemedicine and eHealth (IsfTeH) the conference was opened. With distinguished invited speaker prof Rolf Engelbrecht (Munich, Germany) was arranged video link. Prof Engelbrecht spoke about activities in this area in Germany and Europe, cooperation on Distance learning project with prof Masic from Medical faculty in Sarajevo and organization of 22nd International Congress of the European Federation for Medical Informatics (MIE2009) to be held in Sarajevo.

The conference was divided on three sessions: eHealth/eHealth, eEducation and Health care quality and Health Information Systems. Conference participants with great attention were lessening presentation of two students from Medical faculty in Sarajevo who practically shown distance learning education on Medical faculty and whole process of applying for the exam for the subject Medical Informatics. It was on-line presentation in real time, and presented were web site of the Cathedra for Medical Informatics (www.unsamedinfo.org) and UTIC LUCIS Centrum (www.e-learning.ba).
At the Special Topic Conference eHealth and eEducation took part over 50 participants from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Singapore and Australia.

After the conference, General Assembly of the Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina nominated Aida Pilav, MD to be president of the Society, prof Izet Masic as vice-president and IMIA&FMI representative, Ahmed Novo, MD as secretary and Almir Dzananovic as treasurer. Executive Board members are: prof Z. Hadziahmetovic, University of Sarajevo, prof Z. Sabanovic, University of Tuzla, prof S. Toromanovic, University of Bihac, O. Kordic, Clinical centre Banja Luka, B. Prnjavorac, General Hospital Tesanj and I. Omerhodzic, University of Sarajevo. Members of the Executive Board are elected for the period of four years and they are also members of Local Organizing Committee (LOC) for MIE2009 in Sarajevo.