The eleventh annual IHE European Connectathon taking place in Pisa, Italy from April 11th to 15th of this year has extended to a weeklong program of activities, attracting a great deal of engineers and executives responsible for advancing e-health in Europe.

E-health organization leaders from across Europe plan to attend the real-time assessments, in addition to presenting their individual workshops and meetings during the gathering, creating opportunities for discussion, dialogue and networking.

The main event of the IHE European Connectathon is a 'connectivity marathon,' where for five days more than 300 IT engineers test 117 systems for the interoperability of their applications used in health information systems. The event allows the participating organizations to test the implementation of their IHE and compare their findings to industry peers.

A second testing activity, the Projectathon, will analyze cross-border exchanges of patient summaries and electronic prescriptions. The additional testing coincides with preparations for a large-scale pilot program organized by Smart Open Services for European Patients (epSOS). The project is scheduled to launch later this year.

“After 10 years of steady progress, Connectathon is now seen as [the place] for people to share experiences on e-health implementations,” says Peter Kuenecke, vendor co-chair of IHE Europe Committees.

Workshops open to the public will focus on interoperability for regional healthcare networks, combining radiation dose histories into health records, and applying large-scale telemedicine services. At the same time, the international standards organization DICOM, along with the European interoperability group HITCH and IHE-Europe will hold meetings with their respective members.

The meetings and testing events for the IHE European Connectathon will be held at the Stazione Leopolda, a former railway station transformed into a multifunctional center.