Presentation of the Morris F. Collen Award to Reed McArthur Gardner, PhD

Abstract

Election to the fellows college of the American Medical Informatics Association (The American College of Medical Informatics [ACMI]) recognizes significant and continuing contribution to the field of medical informatics. The College awards its highest accolade once a year, when appropriate, in recognition of lifetime achievement and singular contribution to the field. This award, the Morris F. Collen Award, recognizes those individuals, who, like Dr. Collen, have not only been noteworthy pioneers in the field, but whose professional and personal contribution and conduct over a lifetime are worthy of approbation and emulation. The College has recognized Dr. Reed McArthur Gardner as the 2005 recipient of the Collen Award. Reed's career has evolved with the field, from his earliest days as a hardware engineer building data acquisition devices for clinical decision support systems to his work as an evaluator of hospital information systems. Reed demonstrates persistence, integrity, and a passion for his work. He is a pioneer in biomedical instrumentation and standards, an unrelenting investigator, and a dedicated and demanding educator and mentor and is viewed by his colleagues as an unselfish collaborator and wonderful person to work with. He is fittingly recognized with this highest honor in the field of medical informatics. Figure 1 Reed McArthur Gardner, PhD. Reed Gardner was born in October 1937 in St. George, UT, to Wayne C. and Bessie McArthur Gardner. He was the fourth of five children. Reed's father, a sheep rancher, taught him the joy of work and accomplishment. Reed recounts, “My father taught me how to work. For example, he gave me ‘doggie,’ or orphan, lambs to raise, which I fed with a bottle until they were large enough to join the sheep herd. Then, when the lambs were sold in the fall, Father put the money into a college fund for me.” Tragically, at …