Future Usage Environments and System Integration Issues David Forslund Cognition Group, Inc. HCMDSS Workshop November 16, 2004

11/16/2004Cognition Group, Inc.2 Major Integration Issues Interoperability –Data interpretation (metadata) Common dictionaries, ontologies –Functionality (Service-Oriented Architectures?) –Proprietary barriers Security –Privacy, confidentiality, HIPAA, policies, etc. System evolution – adapting to change –Added, modified functionality –New hardware capabilities Certified behavior of systems –Systems may not be isolated, overall behavior may be unpredictable –Reliability and availability

11/16/2004Cognition Group, Inc.3 Interoperability Multiple platforms force one to deal with interoperability –Most efforts today have been on data interoperability Need mechanisms to rigorously define “behaviors” (UML helps) –How to validate and ensure reliability? Emphasis has been on non-interoperability Open source reference implementations of software required, e.g. IETF approach Need to preserve flexibility and extensibility

11/16/2004Cognition Group, Inc.4 Security Security policies vary by organization and domain –User base not well delineated (identification) Privacy and confidentiality make interoperability more difficult, e.g. HIPAA Physical barriers may make security more difficult to manage Internet is enabler and a barrier

11/16/2004Cognition Group, Inc.5 Bio Dave Forslund is a theoretical and computational plasma physicist who has worked in a broad range of plasma physics, and more recently, in computer science. From 1969 until this year, he worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), including as Principal Investigator on the TeleMed/OpenEMed Project and the Sunrise project, and as the Deputy Director at the Advanced Computing Laboratory. He remains on as a Laboratory Fellow Associate in his retirement from Los Alamos. He has received many honors and awards for his key scientific discoveries and outstanding contributions. He has over 60 publications in refereed journals and has given numerous talks in plasma physics, computer science, and health informatics. Forslund now works with the Cognition Group, Inc. in developing and deploying advanced distributed health care applications based on the OpenEMed technology, and is assisting in the use of OpenEMed for bioterrorism applications and for use in managing special nuclear materials.