Home again, home again, jiggety-jog

Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.
-- Robert Frost

Last week was IHE Public Comment meetings in Oakbrook, Illinois, where we prepare IHE profile proposals for 2013 for public comment.  Oakbrook is like a second home to me, since so many IHE meetings are held there in RSNA's space.  I spend probably 3 weeks a year in the area.  So much so, that they know us by name at our local sushi joint (although it closed finally last Tuesday, we ate there at their last night open).

This week is the HL7 Working Group Meeting in Atlanta (one of HL7's common venues, I've been here 3 times at least).  And I've been in the region enough to know the best local sushi place as well, and last time I was there, they recognized some of us.

In IHE I co-chair one of the committees (Patient Care Coordination) that develops CDA implementation guides, and was at one point in time a member of the IHE Board.  I spend most of my time here working on implementation guides using CDA and other HL7 V3 standards.  I do quite a bit of work harmonizing with HL7.  In IHE, I'm the HL7 guy or the CDA guy.

In HL7 I used to cochair the structured documents workgroup, and am now a member of the board.  I spend most of my time here working on HL7 CDA standards and implementation guides, and other V3 standards (and more recently, beyond V3, including FHIR).  I do quite a bit of work harmonizing with IHE.  At HL7, I'm been referred to by some as being Mr. IHE (although that's a title that was previously held by a GE colleague for many years, and I'm not quite ready to take on his role).

At elsewhere, like in the ONC S&I Framework activities, I'm considered by some to be the IHE guy, and by others, the HL7 guy, depending on which expertise I'm using.

It's always clear to me that where ever I go that I bring with me some other perspective that may not already be present.  Isn't that the point of a consensus body?  To include the needed perspectives that should be at the table.  What I find interesting is that I probably embody more of HL7 or IHE when I'm away from those organizations, then when I'm present in them.  So, even though I've come back to my other home, sometimes, it doesn't always feel so homey.

That's OK, here I am, and they still have to take me in.