HealthCare Business News spoke with Tom Mitchell to learn more about the new developments with Medical World Americas — one of the conferences he produces.

HCB News: What is Medical World Americas?
TM: Medical World Americas (MWA) is a medical conference and expo that fosters collaboration among clinical and administrative professionals from the public and private sectors, as well as the world of academia, to advance the health of our communities. We partner with the Texas Medical Center and its member institutions to create a forum that offers CMEs for all levels of professionals across all disciplines. We are one of the few medical conferences that give doctors, nurses, physician assistants, technicians, administrators, office staff, teachers, and students all a seat at the table.

HCB News: In May, you will have your third event. What’s new for this year?
TM: With any start-up, you learn and adjust as you grow. Our attendees told us they are interested in the future of the landscape of medicine. They told us there are plenty of conferences and meetings for people within their specialty and we shouldn’t try to offer procedural training. We listened and developed a conference and expo with TED-like (technology, entertainment, design) sessions for 2016 — taking the attendee on a journey of disruptive innovation in the medical space.

Our theme for 2016 is “Innovate: Transforming Health through Disruption and Discovery.” We will look at disruptive innovation across several areas of interest. Session topics will include Innovation in Medicine, Entrepreneurship, Digital Medicine, Big Data, Ethical Issues, Population Health and Precision Medicine. Our executive committee, chaired by Robert Robbins, M.D., president and CEO of the Texas Medical Center, has invited world-class experts to lead panel discussions on these topics and more.

The featured speaker this year is inventor, entrepreneur and advocate for science and technology, Dean Kamen, founder of DEKA Research. An inventor with over 440 patents, many of them for medical devices, he will speak to innovation, entrepreneurship and bringing inventions to market. Other featured presentations include “Innovation in Medicine and Health Care,” a panel discussion led by Robbins and Dr. Arthur “Tim” Garson, director of the TMC Health Policy Institute. The session will unveil the results
from the second annual Texas Medical Center Consumer Health Report, a nationwide survey initiated by the TMC Health Policy Institute to reveal attitudes and behaviors of the health care industry, assessing their attitudes and behaviors toward health insurance.

We will also examine the ethical issues in disruptive technologies, the promise and perils of precision medicine, how to individualize care with big data and trends in digital medicine.



HCB News: What are the unique components that will be new this year?
TM:We have partnered with several organizations to provide additional content for targeted audiences. The American College of Healthcare Executives — South East Texas Chapter (ACHE-SETC) will fully integrate its annual conference with MWA over all three days so their members can participate in both sessions. In addition, PricewaterhouseCoopers, the Texas Tribune, the American Marketing Association of Houston and Houston Community College – Coleman College (HCC-Coleman) will all offer programming to their audiences and the ability to participate in the MWA sessions. We will also have a delegation of health startups from Israel, including the winner of the recent mHealth Israel Startup Contest.

The Texas Medical Center also offers unique programming at MWA to feature innovation for both life science and medical students, and startup companies. The TMC has just issued a call for abstracts for the TMC Student Poster Session to be held on May 19, and the Texas Pitch Competition for startup companies to be held on May 20, with cash prizes for first, second and third place. Another new component in 2016 is the MWA job fair. On May 19, MWA is pleased to invite mid-career and graduating students to meet with hiring managers from medical and device companies — and it is free.