The Most Influential Scientists in the Development of Medical Informatics (22): Warner V Slack (1933-2018)

Warner V. Slack (1933-2018), MD, FACMI worked as Professor at Harward Medical School (1-4). Dr. Slack was a 1955 graduate of Princeton, and a 1959 graduate of Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Warner Slack received his bachelor’s degree from Princeton University. His medical internship and residency training in neurology at the University of Wisconsin. Dr. Slack was among the first physicians to envision the essential role that computers would play in medicine and healthcare delivery. His landmark work involving computer-patient interviews, begun during the 1960s, anticipated by decades the now-prevalent field of electronic medical records. A New Jersey native, He served as a captain in the U.S. Air Force in the Philippines during the early 1960s. Over the past 40 years he has focused his research on the use of computers to improve communication in the field of medicine and to empower both patients and doctors for better health care. From 1989 through 1998, he was Editor in Chief of the journal MD Computing. He is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, a member of the Division of Clinical Informatics, Department of Medicine, and Department of Psychiatry at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and, with Howard L. Bleich, MD, co-president of the Center for Clinical Computing in Boston. Prof Slack was Division co-Founder Dr. Warner Slack was given the Medical Alumni Resident Citation Award at the 2012 Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health Alumni Awards ceremony. The award, presented to Dr. Slack in Madison, Wi, honors an individual who has achieved distinction in the practice of medicine, in academic activities and in research accomplishment. Division Faculty member Dr. Warner Slack wrote an editorial on Patient-computer Dialogue. The editorial was recently published in the proceedings of the Mayo Clinic. Division Faculty member Dr. Warner Slack was highlighted in the book The Decision Tree by Thomas Goetz of Wired.com fame. Dr. Slack’s accomplishments in promoting the importance of Patient-Centric medicine and his ground breaking work in proving the effectiveness and importance of the open exchange of information with the patient are the focus of the book’s final chapter. He is the 2001 recipient of the Morris F. Collen Award of Excellence from the American College of Medical Informatics