Clinton on Healthcare “There’s nothing wrong we can’t fix.”

According to The New Orleans Times-Picayune, HIMSS 2013 will be the largest convention this year for the city with more than 35,000 attendees. The visitors will drive about $40 million in spending in New Orleans, according to economic impact estimates. And every hotel room was utilized to accommodate the group. The conference will use all 48 acres of convention floor space. The New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau stated that the HIMSS conference in 2007 was one of the first health care oriented conventions to return to the city after Hurricane Katrina.

President Bill Clinton was the headliner on Wednesday of the HIMSS conference. If you weren’t in line two hours before it started, you didn’t get a seat in the Great Hall. There were closed circuit TV rooms that were SRO and if you weren’t there an hour before you didn’t get a seat in there either. And after all the waiting he did not disappoint. Here is a sampling of what they are saying about his speech.

Bernie Monegain, Editor for Healthcare IT News recaps the keynote in Clinton urges IT pros to help healthcare. She highlights Clinton’s “There’s nothing wrong we can’t fix.” and recalls some of the best of Clinton’s quotes throughout his speech.

Inspiration and Implementation: Bill Clinton’s Keynote at HIMSS 13 from Healthcare IT Connect characterized Clinton as speaking with “a sense of optimism.” Noted that technological implementation was a key theme throughout the speech while Optimism for the future and the power of transparency rounded out the themes.

HIMSS: Clinton sees healthcare IT as global game changer by Cynthia E. Keen in AuntMinnie.com. Cynthia compares this years Clinton comments to that of Bill Gates at HIMSS in 1995 to a crowd of 1000. Read her review.

President Bill Clinton Tells HIMSS Attendees They Will Be Key Leaders in Healthcare Transformation by Mark Hagland in Healthcare Informatics. Former President Clinton invokes the power of health information technology as a key to healthcare reform and health system change. Read his post.

Bill Clinton’s public health, cost-bending message thrills health IT folks at HIMSS is Jane Sarasohn-Kahn’s review on the keynote speech. Jane is a health economist and management consultant that serves clients at the intersection of health and technology. You can read her at Health Populi.

Bill Clinton calls for health care price transparency, embracing IT to cut costs writes Lucas Mearian in InfoWorld. There is no correlation between what people pay and the quality of health care they get, the former president tells health IT professionals. Read the full article.

And the local press, The Times-Picayune, covered the event in nola.com by Laura Maggi. Bill Clinton talks health care transparency at medical IT conference in New Orleans. Read her article.