President's Message

Dear Maryland Chapter of HIMSS Members, Colleagues and Friends,

It has already been a busy summer for our new Board and Committee members as we get ready for another event filled year designed to provide you the best educational, advocacy, golf and social events that we can offer.  Our goal is to provide value to all of our members and participants so that you will look forward to the next opportunity to learn and network.

I have been fortunate to be a part of the Maryland Chapter of HIMSS for the past several years, and every year we strive to add more and more activities for our participants to enjoy.

We have several events planned for the upcoming Educational Year, including our upcoming Networking Event on September 10^th.  Please come out to join us at that event or any other event that we are holding, we would love to see you there.  For a full list of our upcoming activities, please take a look at our website for dates and details.

If you were like me several years ago, and want to take a step further with your involvement with our Maryland Chapter, please reach out to us in person or via e-mail (md.info@himsschapter.org), expressing your interest, and we can see which committee may be a fit for you.  We are a volunteer organization and without the help of Board Members and Committee Members who volunteer their precious time, we would not be able to provide such a vast array of educational and networking opportunities for our members.

I hope to see you at one of our upcoming events.

Bob Hooper
President, Maryland Chapter of HIMSS

Advocacy Committee

See you in the Fall! 

Communications Committee

The Communications Committee enjoyed a brief slowdown in activity over the summer but is now back in to near full swing supporting the August and September events, a membership survey, sponsorships, and a number of behind the scenes activities.  We continue to benefit from the integrated email, registration, and survey functionality of Constant Contact and trust that you are feeling an improved experience as well.  We always enjoy getting feedback on what is working well and where can do things better – please drop us a line anytime at md.info@himsschapter.org .  We are interested in building upon our current core competencies and expanding further into the social media and other digital media arenas.  We want to hear from you if you have an interest in contributing in the areas of web site authoring, graphic design, Constant Contact, photography, videography, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or YouTube.  Again, just drop us a line at md.info@himsschapter.org .  The committee is looking forward to another busy and exciting year supporting the many events and activities offered by the Maryland Chapter of HIMSS! 

Mark Doore
Communications Committee Chair

Community Outreach Committee

This season Community Outreach is working with the Program Planning committee to broaden participation in our educational, social, advocacy and golf tournament by our over 1700 members.   If you are a vendor of a HIT product or service, a sponsorship provides a low cost venue to meet and great potential clients. Click on the  Sponsorship Brochure for full details.

Walter Bergman
Community Outreach and Golf Tournament Chair

CXO Outreach Committee

See you in the Fall!

Membership Committee

This year, the Maryland Chapter of HIMSS has a new committee.  The Membership Committee will be the point of contact for questions regarding local membership.  This committee was created to work with current members to increase participation at our events, and to educate inactive members of the benefits of our chapter.   One of our goals is to greet new and renewing members by e-mail.  We also look forward to hosting “Meet and Greets” at our corporate member and organization affiliate sites. 

To better understand and provide for our member’s needs we will be emailing a member survey on a yearly basis to gather educational thoughts, meeting formats, and to solicit input.  This will be an electronic survey, and your answers are very important to the chapter’s success.  So please look for it in your e-mail shortly and take the time to complete it. 

If you are interested in joining this committee, please contact Brian Zernhelt, Membership Committee Chair, at bzernhelt@softwareconsortium.com or 410-740-1910 x104.

Thank you,

Brian Zernhelt
Membership Committee Chair

Program Planning Committee

Drinks on the Dock Social Event

By David Smith, Maryland HIMSS Board Member and Program Planning Committee Vice-Chair

A special thank you to everyone that Joined us at our end of summer social event Drinks on the Dock at Nicks Fish House on August 20^th.  We also want to especially thank our sponsors of the event; More Direct and CDW.  George Reilly from UMMS was the lucky winner of the 32” LCD TV that was provided by More Direct, congratulations!  In spite of the threatening weather that evening, we had an amazing attendance of 55 members and our Survey of the event demonstrates that everyone was extremely pleased with the location, time of day, food and drink and the opportunity to network.  Some comments we received on the post event survey:  “great way to meet others and chat with them about what they are doing”, “food was excellent and loved the outdoor experience on the water”, “networking was awesome”, “I had a blast last night, and I am looking forward to the September 10th event”. 

We would like to thank you for your continued participation in Maryland HIMSS educational and social events.  If you are interested in volunteering your time to assist with the development and planning of our events, please contact your Program Planning Committee Leadership:

Kathryn Whitmore, Chair (KathrynWhitmore@STSConsultingGroup.com) at 443-742-4643 or

David Smith, Vice-Chair (david.smith@capitaldigestivecare.com) at 240-485-5206

Professional Development Committee

The Professional Development Committee has been reviewing applications for our annual scholarship(s).  We plan to acknowledge our recipients during  our September 10^th Networking Event.  Recipients are selected based on a combination of GPA, course of study and volunteer/professional development activities.  Students will receive $2,500.