Working as a Medical Informatician

Medical professionals frequently have to forge their own paths to achieve proficiency and learn the core components of clinical informatics, understood as the “application of informatics and information technology to deliver healthcare services” [American Medical Informatics Association (Clinical informatics. 2021. https://www.amia.org/applications-informatics/clinical-informatics)]. In this chapter, we present the personal stories of three medical doctors, from different parts of the world, and what motivated, guided, and inspired their journey. Several common themes emerge. The first is self-directed learning, strong mentorship, and the need for the on-going building of communities of practices to share experiences and knowledge. Secondly, there is strong desire to formalise learning during our careers, and we found different ways to achieve this. Finally, health informatics is more about health, clinicians, healthcare and patients and less about informatics, and clinical informatics sits at the core of clinical care. Although the routes and timing of these journeys varied, resonating throughout is a deep desire to impact patients’ lives and improve the ways we provide healthcare.