Sparked Bright Sparks: Michael Strachan

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

❓What is your background?

Mike has worked in healthcare his whole working career.  His undergraduate degree was as a Health Information Manager and has since worked in public and private hospitals systems in Australian and New Zealand over the past 30 years. Mike has now been at Magentus (formerly Genie Solutions) for the past 7 years.

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

Magentus has been a long-term supporter of open standards and early adopter of FHIR for over 6 years now.  We have been going to HL7 Connectathons for many years and using FHIR.  Magentus sponsored and hosted the Sparked launch in Brisbane over two years ago.  We are one of the original Sparked Founding Members.

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

Foundations of a community working toward common goal of solving Interoperability across different parts of the health system that is diverse with industry and government.  Strong bottom-up involvement of a very wide range of stakeholders.

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

Very inclusive, focused on building community.

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

The broad range of stakeholders across public and private that have a common desire to solve the issue of improving collaborative care for all Australians.

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

Chocolate Frog prizes!! Connecting over a drink or two with industry and government community members!

❓ What excites you most about the future with Sparked?

The potential to move forward to solve big problems partnered with industry and government for consumers in a way which delivers value early and, in a cost, effective manner.

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

Governments or DOHAC willingness to co-design with industry.  Well done!

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

The community gets stuff done with a bit of fun on the way.  And the connections and opportunities would surprise you.

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

Don’t wait or sit on the fence.  Come along and try out the community.  It will be worth your time.

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

Fun, Fangled, Folk

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

Don’t Worry Be Happy!!

❓ Describe Sparked using only emojis

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥