Clinical Informatics and Bioinformatics - Career Options

Informatics is a career for the 21st century. Computer technology and the electronic medical record have changed the face of medicine forever.  There are a wide variety of jobs in the industry for people coming from diverse educational and technical backgrounds. Informatics can be viewed as proceeding along a continuum from the cellular level (bioinformatics) to the personal arena (medical or clinical informatics) to population health (public health informatics).  Professionals enter informatics careers in several ways. A clinical background or degree (MD,RN…) can be a precursor to the role of Chief Medical or Nursing Informatics Officer.  Biology or Computer Science education can facilitate a career in bioinformatics.  You do not need to be a computer programmer or a clinician to enter the field but it may affect your role in the industry. 

Clinical informatics usually requires an advanced degree (master degree or higher). There is a clinical subspecialty of Clinical informatics that requires a 2-year fellowship following any clinically recognized specialty training like internal medicine. This fellowship is new and will likely become more important in the future although the vast majority of individuals working in clinical informatics will have an advanced degree but not subspecialty training.  Clinical informatics professionals focus on using information and the electronic medical record to improve outcomes in health care.

Bioinformatics, like clinical informatics, is usually entered at the graduate level.  Biology and computer science backgrounds are helpful but not required.  So much of public health is determined by genetics/genomics or behavioral/environmental factors that harnessing data may improve outcomes in dramatic fashion.  Bioinformatics may revolutionize cancer treatment by using big genomic data to individualize oncology care.

The informatics industry is diverse and to solve the challenges the industry faces, communication between different groups of professional is critical. Informatics physicians need to be able to talk to computational biologists so that the industry can focus on targeted biological questions, not just data mining.  One challenge facing informatics professionals is how to use genomics information clinically by utilizing biomarkers to test meaningful questions in genomic informed clinical trials.  Wherever you are in the field, it is important to understand the assumptions behind the data and the limitations and interpretation of research methods.  I think the best path for anyone entering the industry is to identify an area that you are passionate about and seek out research and volunteer opportunities in that area.  This will help clarify your potential role in the industry. #bioinformatics, #clinical informatics, #population health, #electronic medical record, #genomics, #big data, #chief medical information officer