2026 Annual Symposium Spotlight Sessions
From Health Systems to Learning Systems: The Journeys of Four Pioneers
Sunday, November 8 | 3:30 – 4:45 p.m.
- Chuck Friedman, PhD (Moderator)
- Peter Embi, MD, MS
- Genevieve Melton-Meaux, MD, PhD, FACMI
- Laura Podewils, PhD
Learning Health Systems (LHS) can exist at different levels of scale: individual health care delivery organizations, networks of organizations, and within the boundaries of states or provinces. This panel will focus on individual organizations, recognizing that the "LHS status" of an organization is not binary. An organization's journey to increasing LHS maturity does not start at zero and can proceed along many paths. Accordingly, this panel will begin by offering a model for describing LHS maturity and then describe the paths toward greater maturity taken by four organizations: Denver Health, the Universities of Michigan and Minnesota, and Vanderbilt University. These organizations differ in many respects have pursued distinctive paths. Their paths are similar in that informatics plays critical roles in all four. The role of informatics will be highlighted in all presentations.
Health Information Exchange as Learning Infrastructure: What It Takes to Close the Loop Across Institutions
Monday, November 9 | 2:00 – 3:15 p.m.
- Jiang Bian, PhD (Moderator)
- Neil Sarkar, PhD, MLIS
- Anjum Khurshid, MD, PhD
- Jyoti Pathak, PhD
- Shaun Grannis, MD, MS, FAAFP, FACMI, FAMIA
The learning health system has been built, where it has been built at all, mostly within individual health systems. Yet a patient's care spans health systems, and population health is not bounded by any single catchment area. Health Information Exchanges (HIEs) are the only infrastructure already operating across those boundaries at population scale, and they possess two exemplar assets required for an inter-institutional learning health system: multi-party governance among competing health systems, which cannot simply be purchased, and a continuously operating data-to-evidence flow through mandated public health reporting, though it is rarely named as such. What is missing is not the pipe, but the return path. This panel convenes leaders from regional HIEs and multi-state research networks. Each will describe what their infrastructure does today and where the learning loop breaks down. The discussion will then turn to governance across competitors, who pays for the return path, and what a regional exchange can accomplish that other networks cannot.
Everything Is Bigger in Texas: Building Learning Health Systems to Advance Responsible AI
Tuesday, November 10 | 10:00 – 11:15 a.m.
- Wendy Chapman, PhD (Moderator)
- Mujeeb Basit, MD, MMSc
- Chaitanya Katterpalli, MS, MBA
- Peter McCaffrey, MD
- Robert Murphy, MD
Texas is home to some of the nation's largest and most diverse healthcare systems, each investing in Learning Health System (LHS) capabilities to accelerate continuous improvement and responsible AI implementation. While organizations vary in structure, governance, and technical maturity, they face remarkably similar challenges in transforming routine clinical care into a continuous learning process. This panel brings together leaders from four major Texas health systems and a patient representative to discuss how they are building the infrastructure, governance, culture, and partnerships necessary to support Learning Health Systems. Rather than focusing on technology alone, panelists will share lessons learned from implementing AI, engaging clinicians and patients, establishing governance, measuring impact, and creating sustainable organizational change. The discussion will highlight both common challenges and diverse approaches, providing attendees with practical insights applicable across academic medical centers, integrated delivery systems, and community health system
From Byte to Bedside to Market: Learning Health Systems across Academia and Industry
Tuesday, November 10 | 2:00 – 3:15 p.m.
- Jake Chen, PhD
- Travis Gossey, MD, MS, MPH
- Devin Mann, MD
- Kathy Kim, PhD, MPH, MBA, FAMIA, FIAHSI
- Majid Afshar, MD, MSCR
- Stephen Huo, PhD, MD, MsPH
LHS is often described through the lens of healthcare providers and academic research, but many learning cycles continue through commercialization and industry partners. This panel will explore how academia and industry will function in a broad learning ecosystem, while navigating distinct incentives, evidence requirements, and regulatory frameworks.
