TY - JOUR T1 - Informatics for Health 2017: Advancing both science and practice JF - BMJ Health & Care Informatics SP - 1 LP - 185 DO - 10.14236/jhi.v24i1.939 VL - 24 IS - 1 AU - Philip J. Scott AU - Ronald Cornet AU - Colin McCowan AU - Niels Peek AU - Paolo Fraccaro AU - Nophar Geifman AU - Wouter T. Gude AU - William Hulme AU - Glen P. Martin AU - Richard Williams Y1 - 2017/01/01 UR - http://informatics.bmj.com/content/24/1/1.abstract N2 - Introduction The Informatics for Health congress, 24-26 April 2017, in Manchester, UK, brought together the Medical Informatics Europe (MIE) conference and the Farr Institute International Conference. This special issue of the Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics contains 113 presentation abstracts and 149 poster abstracts from the congress.Discussion The twin programmes of “Big Data” and “Digital Health” are not always joined up by coherent policy and investment priorities. Substantial global investment in health IT and data science has led to sound progress but highly variable outcomes. Society needs an approach that brings together the science and the practice of health informatics. The goal is multi-level Learning Health Systems that consume and intelligently act upon both patient data and organizational intervention outcomes.Conclusions Informatics for Health 2017 demonstrated the art of the possible, seen in the breadth and depth of our contributions. We call upon policy makers, research funders and programme leaders to learn from this joined-up approach. ER -