Public Biography
Vimla. L Patel is a Senior Research Scientist in Cognitive Studies in Medicine and Public Health at the New York Academy of Medicine. She has adjunct professorial appointments in Biomedical Informatics at Columbia University, NY, College of Health Solutions at Arizona State University, and Population Health Sciences at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York. She holds a BSc in Biochemistry and Microbiology from Otago University in New Zealand and an MA and Ph.D. in Educational and Cognitive Psychology (Medical Cognition) from McGill University in Montreal. As a Professor of Medicine and the director of the Cognitive Science Center at McGill, her early research focused on scientific foundations for medical and health education, particularly in cognitive foundations of medical decision-making. As the principal investigator (PI), Dr. Patel was funded by the Canadian Medical and Social Science Research Councils. Subsequently, she expanded these research activities with an informatics focus at Columbia (CU) (2000-2007), Arizona State Universities (ASU) (2007-2009), and the University of Texas-Houston (UTH) (2009-2011). Adjunct appointments as a professor at NY Psychiatric Institute (Columbia), Computer Science (ASU), and Behavioral Health Science (UTH) allowed her to explore the relationship among Cognitive, behavioral, and information sciences in the biomedical domain.
As the PI on two R01 awards, Dr. Patel’s studies focused on cognitive decision-making and errors in a critical care setting (NLM) and young adults’ sexual risk-taking behaviors (NIMH). She completed a successful PI-lead 5-year James S. McDonnell Foundation multisite research project on Complexity and Error in Health Care and a more recent R01 from AHRQ related to the Impact of Meaningful Use on Clinical Workflow in Emergency Departments. These studies identified cognitive processes linked to health behavior outcomes for efficient, effective, and safer health care delivery with decision support systems. Her latest phase of my research deals with cognition and health (conceptual change) in the digital world (Mobile technology) with an initial R18 award from NIMH for early identification of depression and suicide risk. An elected fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy of Social Sciences) in 1996, the American College of Medical Informatics (1996), and the International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics (2017), she received the annual Swedish “Woman of Science” award (1994). Dr. Patel received an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Victoria, recognizing her scientific contributions through cognitive studies in health informatics. Recently, she was awarded the 2021AMIA William W. Stead Award for Thought Leadership in Informatics for bringing novel frameworks from cognitive science to biomedical informatics (cognitive informatics). She is on the editorial board of Intelligence-Based Medicine, a Springer series editor on Cognitive Informatics in Healthcare and Biomedicine, a past associate editor of the Journal of Biomedical Informatics, and an AI in Medicine assistant editor. I have served on the editorial boards of Medical Decision Making, Methods of Information and Medicine, the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Topics in Cognitive Science, and Computers in Biology and Medicine.
Dr. Patel is an active member and has been an AMIA member for over 25 years. She spent ten years as Chair of the Student Paper Competition Advisory Committee (2003-2013), was vice chair of the 2009 symposium’s Scientific Program Committee, served on the Awards Committee (2010-2011), and received a 2013 Leadership Award. She is also a frequent attendee and participant at the annual ACMI Symposia. A member of the “Women in AMIA” organization, she has served for several years as a mentor at the annual meeting for women members and students. She was in the first cohort of the five senior women informaticians in Women in AMIA Leadership program to act as a mentor to selected senior women graduate and postgraduate students and young faculty. She is passionate about the education and training of students and fellows. Dr. has mentored 34 master’s students, 23 doctoral students, and 23 post-doctoral and research fellows.
https://ccsmph.nyam.org/
As the PI on two R01 awards, Dr. Patel’s studies focused on cognitive decision-making and errors in a critical care setting (NLM) and young adults’ sexual risk-taking behaviors (NIMH). She completed a successful PI-lead 5-year James S. McDonnell Foundation multisite research project on Complexity and Error in Health Care and a more recent R01 from AHRQ related to the Impact of Meaningful Use on Clinical Workflow in Emergency Departments. These studies identified cognitive processes linked to health behavior outcomes for efficient, effective, and safer health care delivery with decision support systems. Her latest phase of my research deals with cognition and health (conceptual change) in the digital world (Mobile technology) with an initial R18 award from NIMH for early identification of depression and suicide risk. An elected fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy of Social Sciences) in 1996, the American College of Medical Informatics (1996), and the International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics (2017), she received the annual Swedish “Woman of Science” award (1994). Dr. Patel received an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Victoria, recognizing her scientific contributions through cognitive studies in health informatics. Recently, she was awarded the 2021AMIA William W. Stead Award for Thought Leadership in Informatics for bringing novel frameworks from cognitive science to biomedical informatics (cognitive informatics). She is on the editorial board of Intelligence-Based Medicine, a Springer series editor on Cognitive Informatics in Healthcare and Biomedicine, a past associate editor of the Journal of Biomedical Informatics, and an AI in Medicine assistant editor. I have served on the editorial boards of Medical Decision Making, Methods of Information and Medicine, the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Topics in Cognitive Science, and Computers in Biology and Medicine.
Dr. Patel is an active member and has been an AMIA member for over 25 years. She spent ten years as Chair of the Student Paper Competition Advisory Committee (2003-2013), was vice chair of the 2009 symposium’s Scientific Program Committee, served on the Awards Committee (2010-2011), and received a 2013 Leadership Award. She is also a frequent attendee and participant at the annual ACMI Symposia. A member of the “Women in AMIA” organization, she has served for several years as a mentor at the annual meeting for women members and students. She was in the first cohort of the five senior women informaticians in Women in AMIA Leadership program to act as a mentor to selected senior women graduate and postgraduate students and young faculty. She is passionate about the education and training of students and fellows. Dr. has mentored 34 master’s students, 23 doctoral students, and 23 post-doctoral and research fellows.
https://ccsmph.nyam.org/
Historic ACMI Biography
Vimla L. Patel is Professor of Medicine and Psychology at McGill University in Montreal. She is the Director of the McGill Cognitive Science Centre and the Centre for Medical Education at McGill. She received her BSc in Biochemistry and Microbiology from Otago University, New Zealand, and her MA and PhD in Educational Psychology from McGill University, Montreal. Dr. Patel has done extensive research in medical cognition as it affects medical education, learning, clinical decision support, and interface design. The study of expert performance has been a central topic in cognition; Dr. Patel's work on how facts about health are stored and retrieved by novice and expert performers has improved the breadth of topics to which cognitive theory can be applied and shown how the principles used in medical diagnosis evolve with learning. This work logically overlaps with work with medical decision support, computer-assisted education, and the psychology of human computer interactions. Dr. Patel is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Her laboratory was recently recognized as a part of the Canadian Centres of Excellence Program. She is assistant editor of AI in Medicine, and a co-editor on the monograph series ìCognitive Science and Technology.î She serves on the editorial boards of The Journal of Experimental Psychology and the International Journal of Biomedical Computing.
Affiliations
The American College of Medical Informatics
ACMI is a college of elected Fellows from the U.S. and abroad who have made significant and sustained contributions to the field of medical informatics. It is the central body for a community of scholars and practitioners who are committed to advancing the informatics field.
Year Elected
1996