An outgoing leader in the Military Health System (MHS) is being recognized as one of the most influential women in health information technology. The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) announced that Dr. Karen Guice, principal deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, currently performing the duties of the assistant secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, would be an inaugural recipient of the HIMSS Most Influential Women in Health IT Award. Guice will be one of seven to receive the award for having demonstrated “transformational influence in the health sector.” She was selected from a pool of more than 140 nominations from across the globe.
Established in 2016, the HIMSS Most Influential Women in Health IT Awards celebrate “those female visionaries harnessing the power of information technology to transform health and health care.” To be eligible, nominees needed to have demonstrated “active leadership of the effective use of IT in support of the strategic initiatives of her organization.”
For more than six years, Guice has overseen and moved forward a number of critical health information technology initiatives improving military medical readiness, health and health care for the 9.4 million Americans who rely on the MHS for their care, and the millions of veterans who have transitioned from Department of Defense (DoD) care to the Department of Veterans Affairs. Most recently, she helped lead the acquisition of MHS GENESIS, a new Electronic Health Record that will be deployed around the globe in 55 hospitals, more than 360 outpatient clinics and on the battlefield in support of military operations.
HIMSS described the seven awardees as follows: “Each Awardee collaborates and innovates within her area of health IT-related expertise. Each understands, and has acted upon, the power of harnessing the best of IT across many different components of health and health care including nursing, pharmacy, medicine, government, public policy, industry and business management. The accomplishments of these women matter not only within their respective organizations, but across the health care trajectory.”
Guice will be honored along with the other recipients at an awards dinner Feb. 20, 2017, in Orlando, Florida, during the annual HIMSS conference.