Center for an Urban Future

Taking a quick break from PdF-related coverage, an interesting press release just came in from Center for an Urban Future.

According to the results of a new study the Manhattan-based urban policy think tank released today, New York City could "capture a significant share" of the 212,000 jobs that the stimulus is expected to create nationwide in the health IT sector.

According to the Center’s report, New York City’s small but fast-growing Health IT sector will benefit enormously by the fact that no other place in the country has as many patient records ready for automation. The city is home to 65 hospitals, 1,300 outpatient clinics and over 30,000 doctors --- and only a small fraction of them have previously converted to electronic health records (EHR). The city has other things going for it as well, including a more developed local health IT infrastructure than most other regions. For instance, the city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene pioneered one of the first local initiatives in the nation to help physicians adopt information technology.

The study echoes some remarks we reported on during Internet Week New York back in early June. Throughout the week, there was talk of how New York's digital sector is poised to help the city recapture some of the economic power that Wall Street lost as a result of the downturn. During one such panel discussion, called Start Me Up: Investing in New York's Digital Industry, NYC Investment Fund Senior Vice President Jalak K. Jobanputra also cited the digitization of hospitals as a key opportunity for New York city.

"Given the amount of stimulus money that will be available for digitization in the health care sector, I think it’s a particularly interesting area," she said.

You can read the Center for an Urban Future report in PDF here. Full press release is after the jump.

Flickr via Nexeus Fatale

DUMBO is a hot bed for NYC's tech startups.

Last week, NYU's polytechnic institute hosted the Intelligent Community Forum's Building the Broadband Economy 2009, an international summit on "how to use information and communications technology to build prosperous, inclusive and sustainable communities." Alex Goldman of Internetnews.com was on hand for a panel discussion about New York's tech start up community. The consensus, according to his report, was that the city needs to boost Silicon Alley and reduce its dependence on Wall Street.

"Smart, creative people want to come here," said panelist Jonathan Bowles, director of the Center for an Urban Future. "The number of freelancers is growing. You can see them working out of coffee shops."