Digital Health Sri Lanka 2017 and 2nd Commonwealth Digital Health Conference and Awards today

Minister of Health Dr. Rajitha Senarathne with KPMG Chairman and Senior Partner Marl Britnell (right) and Adrita Bhattacharya – Craven Universal Health Care Specialist, Center for Universal Health Coverage KPMG in the UK

The Digital Health Sri Lanka 2017 and 2nd Commonwealth Digital Health Conference and Awards will be inaugurated by Minister of Foreign Affairs Thilak Marapana and the Minister of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous Medicine Dr. Rajitha Senaratne on Tuesday 10 October at 8:30 a.m. at the Cinnamon Grand. 

Minister of Science, Technology and Research Susil Premajayantha and the Chairman of the Commonwealth Institute for Infrastructure Development Anoop Singh will also attend the inauguration. 

The conference, held under the theme transforming innovative ideas into digital health solutions, will showcase how the health sector in Sri Lanka is undergoing rapid modernisation with implementation of innovative digital health solutions. The link up with the Commonwealth would enable globalisation of these innovations. 

The conference is hosted by the Health Informatics Society of Sri Lanka (HISSL) and the Commonwealth Medical Association (CMA) under the Presidency of Professor Vajira H. W. Dissanayake who is the President of both HISSL and CMA.

The Keynote Address of the Conference will be delivered by Mark Britnell who is the Chairman and Senior Partner for the Global Health Practice at KPMG, UK. At a special meeting with the Minister of Health on Sunday (8) prior to the conference, he said: “It is remarkable what Sri Lanka has achieved in the health sector, there is a story that the rest of the world should know.”

Other key speakers at the conference include Prof. James Batchelor of the University of Southampton, UK; Laureate Prof. Alan Lopez AC of the University of Melbourne, Australia; Prof. Sundeep Sahay of the University of Oslo, Norway; and Dr. Oommen John, President of the Indian Medical Informatics Association and Denis Gilhooly,Founder and CEO of the Global Digital Health 2030 Innovation Task Force.

The conference will feature symposia not only in medical informatics, but also in nursing and physiotherapy information. The allied health track is spearheaded by the International Institute of Health Sciences, Sri Lanka.

With the emphasis on innovation 30 innovative digital health products would compete for Commonwealth Digital Health Awards this year. The awards aim to identify low cost by yet highly effective innovations that could be incubated and scaled up globally through the Commonwealth Institute for Digital Health and the Commonwealth Digital Health Incubator. 

The first day of the conference would feature a ‘Digital Health Mall’ where these innovations would be showcased and judged followed by a panel discussion on funding digital health innovations. The panelists include Reyaz Mihular, Managing Partner, KPMG (Sri Lanka and Maldives); Rajendra Theagarajah Chairman Ceylon Chamber of Commerce and Deputy Chairman, Cargills Bank Ltd., Sri Lanka; Ruvini Fernando, Director (Public Private Partnership Advisory and Deals Strategy) PwC Sri Lanka; Dr. Chamila Ariyananda, Director, Hemas Hospitals, Sri Lanka; Anoop Singh, Chairman, Commonwealth Institute for Infrastructure Development, UK. The Awards Ceremony will take place at 5 p.m. on 11 October with Dennis Galhooly as the Chief Guest.

More information about the conference is available on the conference website – http://www.cmadhc.org.