Evolution of medical informatics societies in the United States.
Medical informatics, the application of computers to medicine, was supported by engineering groups in the 1950s, by biomedical engineering societies in the 1960s, and by medical informatics organizations in the 1970s and 1980s. Because of the highly specialized and technical nature of medical informatics, the dissemination of early articles on the subject was largely dependent on publication of the proceedings and transactions of meetings of professional organizations. The American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) was recently formed from the merger of three professional organizations, each dedicated to medical informatics: the American Association for Medical systems and Informatics (AAMSI), the American College for Medical Informatics (ACMI), and the Symposium on Computer Applications in Medical Care (SCAMC). An increase in professional interest and activity in medical informatics is anticipated in the 1990s.