Call for Papers: WHITE Conference in Health IT

Less than two weeks are left to submit to the call for papers for the 5th annual Workshop on Health IT and Economics (WHITE). Driven by the continuing digitization of medical information, rapid innovations in technology, and the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the landscape of healthcare is changing dramatically. New challenges emerge every day regarding the design, management, utilization, and evaluation of health IT to support the mission of improving quality and reducing costs. They represent unprecedented research opportunities that have the potential to influence both policymakers and practitioners.

WHITE is a health IT summit that gathers prominent scholars in a multidisciplinary setting. WHITE attracts over 100 scholars and thought leaders from more than 40 institutions, 8 federal agencies and industry. This workshop provides a forum for researchers to disseminate their work and network within a growing and vibrant community. WHITE also fosters collaborations between academia, government, and industry.

We solicit papers on a wide range of topics, including, but not limited to, the following: health IT adoption barriers; assimilation of health IT into workflows and organizations; impacts of health IT investments; measures and incentives for meaningful use; business models for health information exchange; IT-enabled new organization forms and delivery processes; market competition and health insurance exchange; health 2.0 and empowering patients; quality transparency and public reporting; as well as big data and medical analytics.

The 5th Annual WHITE will be held in Washington DC, center of health policy debates, on October 10-11th, 2014. The conference is hosted by the Center for Health Information and Decision Systems (CHIDS) at the Robert H. Smith School of Business of University of Maryland.CHIDS (www.rhsmith.umd.edu/chids) was established in 2005, and is the first academic research center focused on health information and decision systems in a leading business school. Partial support for WHITE is provided by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

Please submit an extended abstract of no more than 5 pages (11-point font, one-inch margins on four sides, double-spaced) to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. by Aug 15th, 2014. Authors may also submit full papers, in addition to the abstract. Submissions will be reviewed for novelty, rigor, and policy impact.

This year WHITE will give awards for Best paper, Best student-authored paper, and Young researcher. The latter two awards are given to papers with either a student or junior researcher as the lead author.

Please check http://rhsmith.umd.edu/chids/white for further information and updates, as well as opportunities to become a sponsor for the workshop. If you are new to WHITE, programs and photo albums of previous years are available on the website for your perusal.We look forward to your participation!

Note: WHITE does not assume copyright over work accepted for presentation.

Hope to see you in October!

WHITE 2014 Program Team

Ritu Agarwal (Chair)

Gordon Gao (Co-Chair) 

Jeff MCullough (Co-Chair)

Kenyon Crowley (Program Director)

Faye Baker (Conference Coordinator)

The Workshop on Health IT & Economics is partially supported by the United States Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality (AHRQ)