Sparked Bright Sparks: Marc Belej

We spoke to Marc about his involvement in the Sparked Community, here’s what he had to say!

❓What is your background?

A peculiar mixture of medicine, startup co-founder, software developer and consultant.  
I find that most of us in digital healthcare tend to have done a few different things.

❓ How did you first hear about Sparked and what made you want to become involved?

I can’t recall.  I know it’s only 2 years old, but it feels like Sparked should have always existed.  
The software engineering part of me wants to be involved to establish the elegant patterns so we can move onto more important problems.
The clinician part wants plug-and-play software so that healthcare workers and consumers can have cool stuff and modern technology.

The entrepreneur part wants Australia to be a major global exporter of digital health know-how and tech.

❓ What do you see as the best outcomes that Sparked has delivered or is working towards?

The core mission objectives of producing AU Core Data for Interoperability, which is a non-technical document detailing the important healthcare data to capture and share prepared by the Clinical Design Group; and then the follow-on of the FHIR technical specifications (Implementation Guides) prepared by the Technical Design Group are clear tangible accomplishments.

But perhaps the intangibles will prove even more enduring.  

Sparked has brought the diverse stakeholders in digital healthcare together, established the rules of the road, and achieved consensus on complex topics.  The rest of the world is genuinely seeking to emulate these traits and outcomes that Sparked has produced here in Australia.

❓ How is Sparked different to projects you’ve been involved in before?

Sparked is more expansive, more upbeat and genuinely game-changing.  

In my experience,  integration and interoperability projects have either tended to the academic and ultimately lacked real-world traction in working software; or they have been practical projects under time and resourcing pressure where perhaps two tech wizards just get the job done and connect software A to software B on schedule by any means necessary.   The national scale, the active participation by clinicians, software vendors, architects, policy makers, peak bodies and standards organisations is super impressive and keeping the culture engaging, pragmatic and positive is a real feat.

❓ What is something you’ve learnt from being part of the Sparked community?

I have relearned that whilst we overestimate what we can do in a day, we underestimate what we can do in a year (or three).  
All those collective steps forward accumulate, for as long as we keep taking them.  Some of the powerhouses in the community have been taking those steps for over 20 years, quietly and determinedly.

❓ Can you share one of your favourite or memorable moments from participating in Sparked?

Seeing major software vendors in Australia all in a row, sharing medications and allergies between their systems in real-time, and launching great new software from other vendors, all using the same standards. (They set up the integrations in an afternoon – because standards)

With the Adelaide Oval and Riverbank providing the backdrop and champagne in hand.

❓ What excites you most about the future with Sparked?

The difficulties with healthcare data exchange have held back digital healthcare progress for a long time.  It’s a wicked problem of our own collective making and Sparked is a key solution.  Wicked solutions are rare! With the standards defined and implemented we can look forward to a boom in digital healthcare experiences and productivity.

Data that flows easily and effectively changes almost everything that is possible in digital health. Software that delights patients and clinicians, that can be implemented with trivial technical effort becomes the norm. Learning healthcare systems that are actively drawing on the wealth of data that’s currently siloed away and applying it in real-time will make healthcare radically better.

❓ What’s something unexpected that you’ve learnt/been a part of/connected with through Sparked?

There are more people of goodwill out there, working hard to improve data flow with standards and tech, that have already solved a lot of the problems you don’t even know you have yet.

❓ How would you explain Sparked to someone not yet involved?

Data stuck in silos,

Medical records can’t transfer—

Errors multiply

Systems speak one tongue,

Healthcare information flows—

Better care follows

Six hundred strong voices,
Clinicians, vendors unite—
Standards born from trust

(yes AI helped me with that)

❓ What piece of advice would you share to someone who may not yet be a part of Sparked?

It’s the answer to why you can’t get the software and data that you want.  

Join up, listen, watch, read.  Write some feedback and take the microphone if you like.  You can do a little or a lot.

Your experience is valid and welcome and we can take this far together.

❓ If you had to describe Sparked in three words, what would they be?

People, Data, Rhythm

❓ If Sparked had a theme song, what would it be?

YMCA.  Anthemic.  Everyone knows the words.  Everyone knows the moves.  

🎶 It’s fun to stay at the…🎶🎤

❓ Describe Sparked using only emojis

🏥💾🧩🔗👥🏋️‍♂️🎯🦘🔓💡🌟🚀