Vote for your Healthcare ICT Champion

The search is on for your Healthcare ICT Champion of 2007. This special category of the BT e-Health Insider Awards 2007, sponsored by Microsoft, invites readers to vote for the individual they see as being most worthy of the title.

Nominations were invited earlier this year and six people agreed to let their names go forward. E-Health Insider readers are now invited to cast a vote via the awards site 

The nominations are – in strict alphabetical order:

• Dr Mike Bainbridge, clinical architect, Connecting for Health,

• Sean Brennan, writer and consultant, author of "The NHS IT Project: the biggest computer programme in the world… ever!"

• Ian Fenton, head of IT and leader of the NHS Tayside ICT team,

• Dr Amir Hannan, GP and advocate of patient access to medical records,

• Ben Howison, ICT technical lead for data migration, Barts and The London NHS Trust

• Professor Brian Randell, organiser of the www.nhs-it.info wiki and member of the ‘NHS 23’ group of academics.

The category criteria state that the award for the Healthcare ICT Champion of the Year is “an opportunity to recognise the achievements of an individual who has made an outstanding contribution in the past year.”

Readers may cast one vote; the organisers ask everyone to vote with integrity and use only one e-mail address. Votes will be monitored to detect any breaches of the rule.

The ‘champions’ were nominated by friends, colleagues and admirers earlier this year during the entry period for all six categories of the awards.

E-Health Insider director Linda Davidson said: “This is the first time that we have organised this kind of poll and we were delighted that six great candidates agreed to let their names go forward. They are all outstanding people and obviously enjoy the respect and admiration of those who work closely with them.

“This is an opportunity to make their work known to a wider audience and for readers to get involved in the awards in a real way.”

The winner will be announced at the BT e-Health Insider Awards ceremony on 7 November 2007 in London alongside the winners of the other five categories for:

• Primary Care ICT Team of the Year

• Acute Care ICT Team of the Year

• Community and Mental Health Care ICT Team of the Year

• Excellence in Health Information Management Award

• Healthcare Business ICT Support Team of the Year

Entrants shortlisted in the initial examination of entries will present their work to the judges this week. The list of finalists will be announced next week.