On behalf of the Organizing Committee of the 10th International Congress on Nursing Informatics we invite you to join NI2009 for sharing knowledge and experiences with all delegates.

We warmly welcome you to participate in the 10th Congress on Nursing Informatics with the theme Nursing Informatics - Connecting Health and Humans in support of nursing informatics practice, research, management and education.

Nursing Informatics has a central role in the health care system all over the world. Over the years the role of nurse informaticians has been highly valued by other health care professionals, and it seems that the need for nursing informatics as a field of scientific expertise and practice developer is growing strongly.

Individualized care with interoperable information systems is a goal for nursing practice full of technology. Increasing nursing knowledge, through structured nursing data recorded and stored in data warehouses, has huge potential for improving the information in health care governance. Nursing data can give extra value for managing and evaluating the whole health care service field.

Computers and web-based teaching and learning have been used to prepare nurses for the information society. Innovative education serves possibility to transform health care services worldwide.

The role of the Finnish Nurses Association in the field of nursing informatics is remarkable. With help of the Nursing Informatics Expert Group the Association is aiming to give direction for further education to promote the competency of nursing informatics. The Expert Group will also support networking nationally and internationally.

The Finnish Nurses Association is proud to host NI2009 Congress together with IMIA-NI.

Anneli Ensio Chair, Organizing Committee, NI2009		Kaija Saranto Chair, Scientific Program Committee, NI2009