News > 2012 > Guy Paré elected a member of the Royal Society of Canada

Guy Paré elected a member of the Royal Society of Canada

October 4, 2012

Professor Guy Paré will officially join the Academy of Social Sciences of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) at the induction and awards ceremony on November 17, in Ottawa. This new induction brings the number of HEC Montréal professors in the Royal Society of Canada to 15.

Professor Paré is an expert in information technology (IT) applications in the health sector, and has been focusing on this crucial field for about fifteen years now. The remarkable quality of his research findings has made him one of the leading researchers in the country in this field, and one of the most influential on the international scene. It also led to his being appointed to the Canada Research Chair in Information Technology in Health Care in 2004, an appointment that was renewed in 2009.

In all his work, Guy Paré seeks a better understanding of the role of IT in fostering the (essential) implementation of new organizational approaches to healthcare. His research has made it possible to measure the clinical, structural and financial effects associated with the implementation of emerging IT applications, such as electronic medical record systems, home telemonitoring and digital radiology. He was also the first researcher to define the success factors related to the introduction of home telecare and to issue specific recommendations in this regard.

His research into patient self-management attracted the attention of the World Health Organization (WHO), which invited him last year to join a select group of experts to discuss this issue, in Geneva. Other organizations, like the Canada Health Infoway, the French department of health, and the Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux and the Institut national d'excellence en santé et en services sociaux, here in Quebec, have also called on his expertise.

Professor Paré is concerned about the social repercussions of IT in healthcare, for instance on the quality and accessibility of care, improved practice conditions for healthcare staff, and patients’ responsibility for their own health. He has always considered it a priority to apply new and effective solutions to concrete problems and to transfer knowledge. Accordingly, with a group of collaborators, he designed and implemented a strict methodology for evaluating the risk involved in implementing clinical information systems. The recently commercialized methodology, the fruit of many years’ work, makes it possible to suggest risk mitigation mechanisms and prioritize the suggested palliative measures.

Professor Paré holds an MSc with an information technology specialization from HEC Montréal and a PhD in Administration from Florida International University. He already has over sixty articles published in peer-reviewed journals to his credit, including MIS Quarterly, the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, Social Science & Medicine, the Journal of Medical Internet Research and the Journal of Strategic Information Systems. He currently sits on the editorial boards of four medical informatics journals. Professor Paré teaches in several programs at the School and as part of the MBA in International Hospital and Healthcare Management at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and the prestigious EXTRA program of the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation. 

 

The Royal Society of Canada
The Royal Society of Canada consists of nearly 2,000 Fellows, men and women who are selected by their peers for their outstanding contributions. It brings together the leading researchers from 95 Canadian universities.

There are three Academies of the RSC: the Academy of the Arts and Humanities, the Academy of Science and the Academy of Social Sciences. The latter academy consists of an Anglophone division (maximum of ten new members per year) and a Francophone division (maximum of five new members per year), for all disciplines in the social sciences: administration and management, anthropology, criminology, demographics, law, economics, education, geography, history, journalism, psychology, industrial relations, political science, sociology and social work.