Introductory Paper: Bridging the Gap in Medical Informatics and Health Services Research: An Introduction

As those who attend both the AMIA symposia and the annual meetings of the Academy for Health Services Research and Health Policy (formerly, the Association for Health Services Research) can attest, there has been far too little productive research collaboration between the fields of informatics and health services research. Gaps in coordination among informaticians and health services researchers are particularly ironic in that the opportunities for productive collaboration have never been greater. Many integrated delivery systems and insurers now have access to databases that combine clinical and claims data and are applicable to a wide range of research questions. Many new information technologies and systems are being applied in the …