I returned from Germany to Aizu-Wakamatsu about a week ago to be part of ‘Eyes, JAPAN’ for the third time. Being an information engineer specialized in web and publishing standards, I took my first steps in working on medical applications last year. Working in the field of medicine is always a bit intimidating for newbies. And opening a huge paperwork of medical standards has somehow the sensation like opening the door to a hospital, at the beginning. The environment is very unnatural to you; you have to get into a foreign context to gain some basic orientation and understanding; and somehow the professionals of medicine seem doing magic when doing their job. However big the appreciation for medicine and for those mastering it, lay people normally feel relieved when leaving the realms of medicine.

The interesting part was when I realized that people think and feel sometimes the same way about computer science. To me not only using computer systems but especially manipulating and creating new ones according to specific needs is very natural – it’s what I learned, it’s what I like to do. It’s surely the same for anybody else working in computer science. But I guess for most people computer science might be only a tool that helps to solve some problems of humankind, being happy if there is somebody else who can harness it. And that’s surely something that medicine and computer science have in common one to another.

Last week I had the great pleasure to attend the second meeting of the Health 2.0 Tokyo Chapter. I think times are very thrilling these days, where worldwide people think about how we can combine the benefits of medicine and computer science to make health care more efficient. And to bring together experts from both fields to exchange ideas and achievements is the first big step to reach this goal.

Frederik