Abstract:
Technology is transforming not only the practice of healthcare but also professional
training and educational models. Developing countries, such as Brazil, are increasingly
suffering from a severe shortage of health informatics specialists. Training of professionals
in this field is expensive, and there is a limited supply of high-quality teaching
resources available. We envision that training in health informatics can be better
achieved if cultural and technological barriers are anticipated and the training program
is prepared accordingly. We describe our four-year experience of a Brazil/USA training
program and discuss lessons learned during its implementation. Eleven onsite courses,
one seminar, and two conferences were developed under this unique initiative, which
made possible the collaboration among different countries and distinguished leaders
in the field of medical informatics. We also described a few identified initiatives
to implement health informatics in the curriculum.
