HIMSS announced its Most Influential Women in Health IT Awards nominations to recognize women at every stage of their health IT career, as well as the nine powerful women who will serve as judges to choose the winners.
As a judge for the HIMSS Most Influential Women in HIT Awards, Dana Alexander, RN, said, “I hope women are inspired and empowered to continue to lead, take risks and to be thinking about the upcoming generations. The award winners have a huge opportunity to pave the way for advancement of women leaders and to lessen the gender gap.
Since 2006, Diane M. Carr has served as deputy executive director for operations at the North Bronx Healthcare Network. She also serves on the HIMSS North America Board of Directors and is chair of the HIMSS North America Finance Committee for fiscal year 2017.
Molly Coye: "Women are still vastly under-represented in HIT today, and we need programs like the Most Influential Women in HIT Award to highlight the achievements of women and to inspire other women to set ambitious goals," said Molly Coye, MD, Social Entrepreneur in Residence for the Network for Excellence in Health Innovation.
Jennifer Dennard (@JennDennard) is the founder of #healthITchicks, a growing social networking community of women (and also men) focused on raising awareness of gender-related issues in healthcare IT and the workplace at large.
Adrienne Edens, vice president of Education for the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME), has more than 40 years of experience in healthcare information systems. And yet, she pointed out, “I’ve been in an executive role in HIT for 25 years and haven't seen the kind of increase in the number of women HIT leaders that I had expected during that time.”
"Women in Health IT are making significant contributions to the industry, and their accomplishments deserve widespread recognition," said Fields, DNSc, RN, a professor in the School of Nursing at San Diego State University, where she teaches graduate courses in informatics, performance improvement, and healthcare policy.
"Being involved as a judge for the Women in HIT Awards offers the opportunity to give back and help encourage the next generation of HIT leaders," said Denise W. Hines, DHA, PMP, FHIMSS, CEO of eHealth Services Group, Executive Director of the Georgia Health Information Network (GaHIN) and nationally recognized expert in state government in health information exchanges.
“A few years ago at the HIMSS Annual Conference, I painted a painting called ‘HIMSS AND HERS’ calling out the need for parity in gender at the national meeting, so I was super excited to see a spotlight on this issue,” said Regina Holliday, referring to the 2015 HIMSS Compensation Study, which shed light on the widening IT gender compensation disparities among health IT workers.
Smith unveiled at HIMSS16 the inaugural Annual Most Influential Women in Health IT Awards, a first-of-its-kind program recognizing influential women at all stages of their careers.