This article will cover four main topics:
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Staff changes
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Review of the May Working Group Meeting in Madrid
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Staff projects and priorities in 2025
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AI activity
Staff Changes
We begin the second half of the year with several staff changes.
Two long-term staff members, Sadhana Alangar, PhD, Director of Education, and Dave Hamill, HL7’s Director of Program Management Office, retired from HL7 during the first half of the year.
Sadhana Alangar served as HL7’s Director of Education from August 2017 through March of 2025. Many new and exciting educational programs were launched during Sadhana’s tenure with HL7, including the Education Partner Program, restarting the first-time attendees’ program, and offering free education at the WGMs. Sadhana is now spending more time with her husband Pinaki and their children in the Chicago area.
Dave Hamill served as HL7 Director of the Program Management Office for over 20 years. Dave launched Project Insight and search project database at HL7 many years ago and has been very active on the internal PBS Metrics task force for several years, developing reports and other tools to help co-chairs and work groups track their projects. An avid golfer, Dave can be found on the greens almost every day now.
We were fortunate enough to hire new employee, Michelle Hill, as the Senior Education Manager before Sadhana’s departure, which gave her some time to learn the ropes. Michelle has an Master of Education in Adult Education and a graduate certificate from Pennsylvania. She previously worked in education at Wellframe/Healthedge and Humana Healthcare. She is a welcome addition to our staff.
Our newest employee is Danny Laurent, Director of Resource Development, is our newest employee. He joined HL7 in May after serving as Senior Director, New Business Development at Save the Children and brings a wealth of experience in fundraising, grant writing, business development and market positioning to HL7. We look forward to his contributions to our team.
May Working Group Meeting & FHIR Connectathon® in Madrid
In May, we had a fantastic Connectathon and Working Group Meeting (WGM) in Madrid. The Connectathon® was held May 10 – 11, followed by the WGM May 12 – 15.
FHIR Connectathon
The Connectathon drew 116 attendees to 12 tracks, including:
- CDS Hooks
- Clinical Reasoning
- Device
- European Health Data Space (EHDS)
- Evidence Based Medicine
- FAST Infrastructure (Security & Identify)
- International Patient Access (IPA)
- International Patient Summary
- Molecular Definition Logical Model and CD
- Questionnaires
- Vulcan/Gravitate Health – ePI and GIDWG/IDMP
- Vulcan Utilizing the Digital Protocol (UDP)
Reports from the 12 tracks are found here.
Working Group Meeting
The Working Group Meeting kicked off on Monday morning, May 12, with a keynote presentation by Miguel Lopez Valverde, Minister of Digitalization, Madrid (enter pic here). Similar keynote presentations were provided during the general sessions Monday – Wednesday, including:
- Fulvia Raffaelli from the European Commission and Juan Angel Morejudo Flores, Managing Directo of the Digital Transformation Agency, Castilla-La-Mancha on Tuesday, and (enter their pics)
- Alexander Zlotnik, Deputy Assistant Director General, Deputy Directorate-General for Digital Health Services and General Secretariat for Digital Health, Information and Innovation of the National Health System, Ministry of Health (enter pic)
These keynotes were informative and well received by our attendees.
In addition to providing keynote presentations each morning, the Madrid meeting also offered a robust series of educational sessions Monday – Thursday morning. These educational sessions included speakers from around the world sharing their implementation experiences. The sessions were well attended, drawing approximately 50 attendees on Monday and Tuesday and 25-30 attendees later in the week.
You can find the general session and educational session slides from the May WGM here. (scroll to the bottom of the page and find 2025 May Working Group Meeting.)
During the Tuesday Board meeting in Madrid, the Board approved the formation of the Devices FHIR Accelerator. This decision was the result of reviewing the strong, positive response received from the global community during the first months of this year as we conducted webinars, in-person presentations and individual discussions regarding becoming Founding Members (see materials posted below). Our “formation” work is far from done, as we continue to work with organizations evaluating becoming the initial cadre of Founding Members. More information about the Devices Accelerator is located here. Contact Todd Cooper (Todd.cooper@devices.hl7.org).
Another decision made at the Board meeting was to update the organization vision statement based on feedback from the community on the strategic framework. The updated vision statement is: A world where every individual has secure, timely, and appropriate access to accurate health information, empowering them, their care teams, and communities to make informed decisions anytime, anywhere.
Additionally, the Board approved the Strategic Plan Document, which was updated based on input from the community. Thank you to everyone who reviewed and provided comments on the framework. The final document is found here (need link).
Other decisions made during the May 13 Board meeting include:
- Dissolution of the HL7 Interoperability Foundation (Woody Beeler Foundation) as the funds have now all been awarded via scholarships
- Approval of the FHIR Publishing Commercial Partner Program
Our May Working Group Meeting would not have been as successful without the leadership and input from Francisco Pérez (Paco), Chair of HL7. Paco began meeting with staff following the May 2024 Working Group Meeting and provided fantastic ideas to make this event successful. He worked as a liaison between the staff and the hotel and AV company, arranged for the keynote speakers, secured nearly $50k in sponsorships for the meeting, and enlisted the assistance of his son, Alfonso. We owe Paco a debt of gratitude, so please join me in congratulating him on a job well done!!
Staff Projects and Priorities
While our staff is always busy providing services to the H7 community, we are focused on a couple of strategic priorities this year:
- Listserv manager upgrade – after several months of testing, the tech team rolled out the new Sympa listserv manager earlier in the year. Our old listserv manager was no longer being supported. So far, very few issues with the new listserv manager have been reported. Many thanks to our tech team for ensure a smooth transition from the old to the new listserv.
- Updating the HL7 website – The staff has kicked off a project to update HL7.org. We are currently working on the Discovery & Planning Milestone, which includes two phases, Discovery & Initial research followed by Requirements and Planning. Both phases are being led by our marcom team. Started on April 7, discovery & initial research is expected to last 12-16 weeks and involves:
- Gathering data via Google Analytics and Clarity on the pages most frequently visited by those coming to our website, how long they stay, where they exist, etc.Evaluating other websites to identify features that we like and want to include on our newly designed website
Following discovery and planning, we’ll be moving on to requirements and planning. This involves analyzing the collected data and documenting requirements, prioritizing areas for re-design, etc. This project will not be completed in 2025, but we hope to launch the new site, with assistance from some AI tools, in 2026.
- One of the major projects for staff focus during the summer months is process improvement. We are currently working to document the many processes across HL7 and will be participating in a 10-week process improvement course provided by a trained process improvement consultant. We are aware that many of the internal processes completed by staff as well as the processes that members and community completed to participate in our community are in need of improvement. We are looking to automate manual processes and find AI tools to help simplify other processes for staff and the community alike. Stay tuned for more information about this exciting initiative.
AI Activities
Just prior to the May WGM, we announced the availability of a report titled Reducing Fraud and Improving Payment Integrity in Healthcare Through the Use of AI. The report summarizes the current landscape and opportunities for using AI to improve payment integrity and reduce fraud, waste and abuse. It synthesizes insights from a broad range of stakeholders, including payers, providers and technology experts. Find the report here. Many thanks to Janet Marchibroda and Marc Overhage, MD, PhD, who drafted this report in collaboration with David Bray, PhD, MSPH, of the Stimson Center.
In addition to the report, HL7 has announced an AI Challenge, designed to spotlight the transformative potential of AI when powered by open health data standards. The Challenge’s focus is on the use of HL7 standards to power AI applications that solve real-world clinical, operational, or equity-focused problems. Solutions may include, but are not limited to, clinical decision support, ambient documentation, population health, predictive analytics, or bias mitigation strategies. This initiative is co-chaired by Ken Rubin. Submissions are due July 30, 2025 and winders will be announced the week of September 4.
Additional information about the challenge is available here.
The summer is a busy time here at HL7. We’ll be conducting the usual Board, TSC, International Council and co-chair elections during the month of July. We encourage all members to participate in these elections either by running or submitting your votes. It is your way to take an active part in sharing the future of this organization. More information about elections can be found here.
The HL7 staff wishes you an enjoyable and safe summer, and we look forward to seeing you at the HL7 Plenary meeting in Pittsburgh.
