Dear AMIA Members,
Happy March! As we approach the call for participation deadline for the AMIA 2022 Annual Symposium, we would like to provide an update on the status of the AMIA Inclusive Language and Context Style Guidelines (ILCSG).
Over the past few months, the AMIA Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Committee and its Communications Subcommittee has been working on an AMIA ILCSG, led by Oliver J. Bear Don’t Walk IV, Clair Kronk, Randi Foraker, Rebecca Rivera, Hu Huang, and Tiffani J. Bright. This important project takes significant time and effort, as well as adequate consideration and intentionality by the Committee.
Language is one approach to examine and subvert misleading and harmful dominant narratives around health. The language we use as informaticians has the power to shape the narratives we tell with our work by enabling us to challenge systems of harm and oppression.
To develop the ILCSG, we have been studying and working from guidelines from similar organizations, such as the American Medical Association (AMA). The AMA guidelines will be a starting point for the AMIA 2022 Annual Symposium Scientific Program Committee (SPC). All authors are advised to review these guidelines in preparing submissions for the AMIA 2022 Annual Symposium. The SPC will be considering inclusive language as one of its criteria in peer review and may ask authors for revisions if non-inclusive language is identified.
We are approaching this process with humility about what we do not know. While we do our best to educate ourselves and members, we recognize that language will shift and change. We look forward to your contributions as we move forward with our efforts to formalize the AMIA ILCSG for AMIA’s Annual Symposium in 2023.
If you have questions, concerns, or suggestions, please do not hesitate to reach out to any of us.
Sincerely,
Gretchen Purcell Jackson, MD, PhD
Oliver J. Bear Don’t Walk IV, MS, PhD Candidate
Hu Huang, PhD
