The science of information as applied to or studied in the context of biomedicine is known as biomedical informatics. Also refers to the field concerned with making the best use of information, often aided by technology, to improve individual health, health care, public health, and biomedical research. Informaticians (sometimes informaticists) are informatics practitioners who focus on information rather than technology.
In addition, biomedical informaticians in the pharmaceutical drug industry design and manage pharmacovigilance programs to improve clinical trial and drug testing safety. To detect drug trial errors or unknown side effects, pharmacovigilance software systems employ data science and predictive analytics.
Other uses of informatics in biomedical and health-related areas include:
• Clinical informatics – Informatics that is used in healthcare or individual health settings. This field is sometimes referred to as medical informatics. The application of informatics focused on specific healthcare disciplines, such as nursing (nursing informatics), dentistry (dental informatics), pathology (pathology informatics), and so on, usually includes the name of that discipline.
• Bioinformatics – The use of informatics in cellular and molecular biology, with an emphasis on genomics. Bioinformatics applied to human health is referred to as translational bioinformatics.
• Imaging informatics – Imaging informatics, which includes the use of PACS systems to store and retrieve images in health care settings.
• Consumer health informatics – A branch of informatics that focuses on the consumer. This includes a growing emphasis on translational research, which aims to accelerate research findings from the bench (biological) to the bedside and into widespread clinical practice.
• Public health informatics – The use of informatics in public health applications such as surveillance, reporting, and health promotion.
• Health information management (HIM) – While not a formal discipline, HIM has historically focused on medical record management. This field has been in transition as the medical record has become electronic, and it now increasingly overlaps with informatics.
