David Ingram: Looking back on a career as a physicist, working first in industry, then in the NHS, and latterly in academic medical departments and institutions, it is salutary to reflect how limited and transient has been the progress in achieving translation of informatics into health care and clinical practice. It is arguable that there has been more progress in the reverse direction, learning from diverse disciplines about the inherent challenges of successful implementation of IT systems within complex organisations. The problems encountered by successive major national programmes, responding to growing worldwide aspiration for progress in the field, gives pause for thought about what evidence-driven policy in this field might look like. In this talk Prof. David Ingram will outline areas of translational research and education in which he has participated, over thirty and more years, starting with mathematical modelling of human physiology, moving on to clinical skills and medical education, and finishing with health records and health information architecture. He will place these examples in the context of wider professional and patient care priorities and pre-occupations, decade by decade, as exemplified in research and development agendas and health service strategies, nationally and internationally. Medicine has been characterised as the domain which is richest in stimulating ideas for research on innovative applications of IT, but also the most difficult in which to bring such ideas to fruition, for patient benefit. Reflecting on that proposition, Prof. Ingram's conclusions will focus on health informatics as a discipline; how it has faired and where it must progress, so that commensurate benefit can accrue from efforts and resources devoted to the field.