SECOND LHS SUMMIT SPONSOR WELCOME
Dear Summit participants,
With great anticipation, I look forward to seeing all of you at the Second Learning Health System (LHS) Summit on December 8-9, 2016. Every one of you was invited because of your evidenced interest in and passion for our shared LHS vision – because of the small and big things you and your organizations have all done for years to help us realize it together.
My personal experience as a prostate cancer patient led me to establish the Kanter Health Foundation (KHF) over two decades ago. At that time, before “Internet” was a household word, I called for the collaborative realization of a health network that would draw on the collective real-world health experiences of millions of patients captured in electronic, computable form, to empower researchers, and ultimately clinicians and patients, to know what works best for every patient for every disease. Indeed, KHF envisions a world in which every decision affecting health is informed by knowledge of what works best; I have devoted the past two decades of my life to transforming that vision into reality.
Thanks to the tireless dedication of so many of you, that original vision has grown into the concept of a LHS. KHF funded the first LHS Summit in Washington, DC four years ago, to develop a set of shared LHS Core Values that would be the compass that would guide us on our path to collaboratively realizing the LHS. Together, we transformed that moment into a movement. We created an ever-expanding grassroots Learning Health Community bonded together by our consensus LHS Core Values, and spread these shared LHS Core Values nationally and globally. Burgeoned by a sense of urgency that we can no longer afford – in dollars and in lives – to let the status quo in healthcare and health continue, we took a vision once seen as impossible and made it imperative and ultimately inevitable. Together, we and our colleagues literally put the LHS on the map, and made it the destination. We came together to achieve consensus; we overachieved.
Our shared task now is to harness this momentum and build consensus around actions we can all take separately and together to accelerate progress. I eagerly anticipate this most important working meeting.
I drafted this message as my spouse (of 63 years) Nancy and I prepared to celebrate Thanksgiving with our children and our grandchildren. Because of your efforts and collaboration, my children and grandchildren, your children and grandchildren, and one day all of their children and grandchildren, will live healthier and more empowered lives. For that, I give profound thanks. Let’s continue to all work together to give the gift of health to current and future generations, across our nation and around the world.
Sincerely,
Joseph H. Kanter
Chairman & President
Joseph H. Kanter Family Foundation
c/o: Bloom Gettis & Habib PA
2601 S. Bayshore Dr. Suite #1450
Miami, Fl. 33133
What will be YOUR Health Legacy?
www.kanterhealth.org
Joseph H. Kanter Family Foundation 