A perspective on integration and outreach: Guiding concepts in the evolution of health informatics

•The National Library of Medicine’s IAIMS initiative played a central role in the evolution of health informatics.•As health informatics evolved, so too did IAIMS and IAIMS-related concepts, integration and outreach.•In the early 1980s, these two concepts guided the development of a campus-wide information utility.•In 2020, these same concepts helped to shape the creation of a center for innovation in health informatics.•Initiatives announced in 2024 promise to carry these concepts forward. The National Library of Medicine’s Integrated Academic/Advanced Information Management Systems (IAIMS) initiative played a central role in the evolution of health informatics over the project’s lifetime (1983–2009) and continues to do so. Our objective is to demonstrate how IAIMS and two key IAIMS concepts, integration and outreach, have functioned at very different times during this evolutionary process. Using a framework drawn from Lorenzi and Stead’s 2021 history of IAIMS, we examine the role of integration and outreach in work at the University of Maryland Baltimore (UMB) in the early 1980s and at the University of Texas Arlington (UTA) in 2020. Guided by these concepts, UMB implemented a campus-wide information utility, while UTA established a center to accelerate research and innovation. Outreach and integration have been formative in the evolution of health informatics and will continue to hold their power.