Job description

Gunnar Hartvigsen, PhD, is professor at the University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway (UiT), Faculty of Science and Technology, Department of Computer Science, and Head of the Health Informatics and -Technology group (HIT) (former: Medical Informatics & Telemedicine group (MI&T)). Hartvigsen is also professor 2/Forsker 1 (Senior researcher) at The Helgeland Hospital Trust/Helgelandssykehuset HF (from 2023). In 2018-2022, he was professor at Department of Health and Nursing Science, Faculty of Health- and Sport Science, University of Agder (UiA) (part time) and affiliated with the Centre for e-health, UiA. Dr. Hartvigsen was in 2016–2017 professor at the Norwegian Centre for eHealth Research, University Hospital of North Norway (UNN) (part time). In 2000-2015 he was professor at the Norwegian Centre for Integrated Care and Telemedicine (NST), University Hospital of North Norway (UNN) (part time). He holds an MSc and a PhD degree in Computer Science (Artificial Intelligence) from UiT. Prior to joining the Department of Computer Science at UiT, he was a research fellow at the Bodø Graduate School of Business, Norway (1987-89). From 1989, he has held different positions at UiT: assistant professor (1989-1991), associate professor (1991-1994) and professor (1994-). In 2021, Hartvigsen established the company Akademisk mentor AS where he is the general manager.

In 2005-2009 he was Vice Dean for research and education at the Faculty of Science, UiT. He has held several honorary posts at the Department of Computer Science, including Head of Department, Vice Head of Department, and Head of Education. He has been member of several boards and committees at the university, including deputy member of the board at UiT. In 2004–2006, he was chairman of the Norwegian Council for Computer Science. From 2010–2017, he was member of The National Committee for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (NENT). From 2005-2013, he served as board member of the Norwegian Society for Medical Informatics (FDH and later NorHIT). In 2007-2015, he was director and research manager of Tromsø Telemedicine Laboratory (TTL), one of Norway’s first centres for research-based innovation (SFI). 

He has supervised 90 master’s students (theses) and 16 PhD students. Dr. Hartvigsen is currently supervising/co-supervising 6 PhD students and 7 master’s students. Furthermore, he has supervised 7 postdocs (at UNN). Since 1992, he has been a member of more than 100 adjudication committees for faculty positions (Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, and USA). He has acted as referee for several conferences, journals, and research councils.

Dr. Hartvigsen has been a member of several doctoral adjudication committees in Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands. He has participated in several international expert panels for evaluation of large applications with budgets of up to € 50 million in Sweden (VINNOVA) and Finland (Academy of Finland and TEKES). In 2020, Hartvigsen was a member of international evaluation panels for Horizon 2020-IMI2 (Innovative Medicines Initiative) and Health SC1-BHC-06-2020.

In recent years, Dr. Hartvigsen has been teaching courses on Telemedicine and eHealth Systems (MSc, PhD), Medical Informatics (MSc, PhD), Electronic Health Records (MSc), Software engineering (BSc), and How to do research / communicating research (PhD). In addition, he has been teaching/organising several special curriculum courses for PhD students. Hartvigsen has extensive experience from study administration from several universities, including planning and management of study programs and courses.

In 2021, Hartvigsen was awarded NOK 6.3 million from DIKU (the Directorate for Internationalization and Quality Development in Higher Education) to establish an experience-based master's in digital health services together with the health service in the Helgeland region.

Dr. Hartvigsen has received several grants from the Research Council of Norway (Tromsø Telemedicine Laboratory NOK 240 Mill. 2007-2014 (NOK 80 Mill. from RCN + NOK 160 Mill. from the partners); Context-sensitive systems for mobile communication in hospitals NOK 4,4 Mill. 2007-2010; DiPato - Distributed Electronic Patient Record NOK 1,5 Mill. 2000-2004; Global Distributed Diary NOK 3,3 Mill. 1996-2001), Helse Nord (Smartphones in Type-2 Diabetes Group Education Programs, NOK 2,8 mill. 2014-2017; Moving pre-surgical planning from the hospital to the patient at home through electronic collaboration (eTeam-Surgery) NOK 8,1 mill. 2013-2016; Impact of Experience Sharing on Type 2 Diabetes Self-Management, NOK 2,5 mill. 2011-2013; Self-help through a mobile ICT tool, NOK 2 mill. 2005-2008), Tromsø forskningsstiftelse (Mobile phone-based health information for people with diabetes, NOK 1,2 mill., 2011-2014), Regional Research Fund North-Norway (CADMOS – serious games for children with diabetes, NOK 3 mill, 2014-2016). Horizon 2020 (WARIFA 2021-2024, EURO 710.000). At UNN, Hartvigsen has contributed to several EU projects, including Renewing Health 2010–2013, FI-STAR 2013–2015 and HEIR 2020-2023. (1 € ≈ 10 NOK)

His research interests include various aspects of telemedicine and medical informatics, including electronic disease surveillance, self-help systems for people with chronic diseases, social media and mixed reality social computer games for people with chronic diseases, medical sensor systems, HCI for mobile systems, digital patient communication, context-sensitive communication, physical activity sensors, m-health applications for people with intellectual disability, telemedicine systems in private homes, and motivational mechanisms in e-health.

In 1994-95, he was on sabbatical leave at the University of Twente, Faculty of Computer Science, The Netherlands. In Fall 2006, he was on sabbatical leave at the Faculty of Medicine, Munich University of Technology and Department of Health Science and Technology, Aalborg University. In 2011-2012 he was visiting professor at the University of California Davis (September-December 2011 & April-July 2012). In 2017-2018 he was visiting professor at the Technical University of Valencia (UPV), Spain, in 2021-2022 visiting professor at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, and in June 2022 visiting professor at Aalborg University, Denmark.

Hartvigsen has an extensive scientific production. Dr. Hartvigsen has written three books (“The Researcher’s Handbook”, “Computer Ethics” and “Lessons learned from 25 years with telemedicine in Northern Norway” (English and Russian edition)) and more than 400 papers and reports on telemedicine, electronic disease surveillance, EHRs, self-help systems for people with chronic diseases, intelligent homes, dis­tributed applications, software agents, adaptive user interfaces, file systems, educa­tional software, knowledge-based systems and ethics. He has recorded more than 900 contributions in the Norwegian publication database Cristin.

Hartvigsen has established extensive cooperation with several outstanding international research groups in medical informatics. As a result, he has published scientific papers together with more than 150 researchers from several countries, including researchers at University of Washington, Seattle, USA; Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA; University of California, Davis, USA; University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, USA; Columbia University, New York, USA; Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA; Technische Universität München, Germany; Technical University of Valencia, Spain; University of Geneva, Switzerland; Aalborg University, Denmark; and Karolinska Institutet, Sweden.

Hartvigsen has been a member of Academia Borealis, Northern Norway Academy of Science since the Academy was founded in 2001. In 2016, he was elected as a member of NTVA, Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences.

In 2014, he was awarded Forskerforbundet’s (Norwegian Association of Researchers) “hjernekraft pris” (Brainpower award) for his contribution within self-help systems for the treatment of people with diabetes.

Hartvigsen is presented in “Biographical Lexicon of Medical Informatics” (2015) and listed in “Who's Who in Ethics” (Global Ethics Observatory, unesco.org).

He has been invited as a speaker on telemedicine and eHealth in several countries, including Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Greenland, Germany, France, UK, Spain, Poland, Russia, Czech Republic, USA and Australia.

His h-index = 32 according to Google Scholar, i10-index = 75 and his publications have received over
5250 citations, of which more than 2800 since 2018.