• VuiG e.V. Called Country Representatives for Austria, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland

     
    ANN ARBOR, MI, July 17, 2019 – The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) and the Akademie für Unternehmensführung und IT-Service Management in der Gesundheitswirtschaft (AuiG), the educational arm of the VuiG e.V., institutionalized the International Certified Healthcare CIO (CHCIO) program in German-speaking communities, i.e. Austria, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland.
     
    After the first successful examination and preparation course for the International Certified Healthcare CIO (CHCIO) at the Health Information Executives Leadership Summit in May, the Board of Executives of the VuiG e.V., i.e. Dr. Napieralski-Rahn, Martin Große-Kracht, Wolrad Rube, Udo Purwin and Dr. Pierre-Michael Meier, called the following Country Representatives:
    • Austria: Christoph Kauer
    • Belgium: Willy Heuschen
    • Germany: Ralf Hörstgen
    • Switzerland: Peter Summermatter
    The Country Representatives will report on the situations in their countries at the Health Information Executives Leadership Summit in May 2020 in Neuss. The reports will pick up the following points:
    • History of health-IT in the different countries
    •  Status quo, i.e. focus on
      • Interactive planning and documentation solutions for caregivers
      • Interoperability in hospitals
      • Interoperability between inpatient and outpatient care
      • How the CEO and CIO work together
    • Possible Outlooks
      • Interoperability between individual health records and institutional medical records
      • How will the CEO and CIO work together with respect to the International Certified Healthcare CIO (CHCIO) program?
     
    “CHIME, AuiG and VuiG e.V. are committed to helping our members lead the transformation of digital health,” said Dr. Pierre-Michael Meier, executive vice president and CFO of VuiG e.V. AuiG is VuiG e.V’s educational arm. “We are thrilled to have our members be the first ever to earn credentials through CHIME’s German exam. Opening chapters in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Switzerland will provide even more opportunities to collaborate, learn together and use innovative and disruptive technologies to improve care.”
     
    VuiG e.V. serves CIOs in a community – ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK network – that includes 34 user associations, over 800 hospital locations, over 130 vendors and exclusively selected consultancies. VuiG e.V. has been a growing and active community within the ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK network since its foundation in 2006. The ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK network develops digitized solutions in the healthcare sector, provides hospital decision makers with tools to be successful, and serves as an incubator to test innovations.
     
    CHIME is a membership-based organization serving more than 2,900 chief information officers (CIOs) and senior healthcare executives in 56 countries. CHIME offers online and in-person educational and networking opportunities as well as accreditation through a domestic and international CHIME Certified Healthcare CIO (CHCIO) program.
     
    CHIME now has eight international chapters. CHIME established a CHIME chapter in Italy earlier this year and in India in 2017. In addition, CHIME has signed letters of intent for partnerships with organizations in Canada, Ireland, the UK and Israel.
     
    About CHIME
     
    The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) is an executive organization dedicated to serving chief information officers (CIOs), chief medical information officers (CMIOs), chief nursing information officers (CNIOs) and other senior healthcare IT leaders. With more than 2,900 members in 56 countries and over 150 healthcare IT business partners and professional services firms, CHIME provides a highly interactive, trusted environment enabling senior professional and industry leaders to collaborate; exchange best practices; address professional development needs; and advocate the effective use of information management to improve the health and care in the communities they serve. For more information, please visit chimecentral.org.
     
    About AuiG, VuiG e. V. and the ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK Network
     
    VuiG e.V. is the home of CIOs in 34 user associations in the ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK Network. The ENTSCHEIDERFABRIK network includes 34 user associations, over 800 hospital locations, over 130 vendors and exclusively selected consultancies. The network develops digitized solutions in the healthcare sector, provides hospital decision makers with tools to be successful, and serves as an incubator to test innovations. Membership into VuiG e.V. is by title as a part of an executive team or by qualification. AuiG is VuiG e.V.’s educational arm and validates the qualification of VuiG e.V. members.
     
    Contacts
    Candace Stuart
    Director of Communications and Public Relations, CHIME
    +1734.665.0000
     
    Dr. Pierre-Michael Meier
    President & CEO
    AuiG Academy
    Posted 7.17.2019

  • 1,000+ Maryland Prescribers Now Use DrFirst’s iPrescribe℠ to Access the State’s PDMP and Keep Patients Safer

    DrFirst and MedChi collaboration continues to enable better-informed prescribing decisions for state prescribers from within e-prescribing workflows

    ROCKVILLE, MD – July 16, 2019 – More than 1,000 Maryland prescribers are making more informed prescribing decisions since adopting DrFirst’s mobile medical management platform, iPrescribe, to consult the state’s prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP) database. DrFirst, the nation’s leading provider of e-prescribing, medication management, and pricing transparency solutions, joined forces with MedChi, The Maryland State Medical Society and CRISP, Maryland’s state-designated health information exchange (HIE) and operator of the state’s PDMP, to bring the first mobile application to efficiently access the PDMP within e-prescribing workflows to Maryland prescribers in 2018.

    Since July 1, 2018, Maryland has required prescribers to query and review the PDMP database before initially prescribing an opioid or benzodiazepine and every 90 days after that. Before implementing iPrescribe, few prescribers could access the PDMP without leaving clinical workflows. The query process was time-consuming, cumbersome, and complicated when it happened at all. DrFirst’s iPrescribe gives authorized users easy access to a patient’s history of controlled substance prescriptions, facilitating better-informed clinical decisions, and increasing patient safety.

    “Our joint initiative with MedChi and CRISP is ensuring that Maryland prescribers have ready-access to critical prescription details in the PDMP so they can keep their patients safe while caring for their health needs appropriately,” said G. Cameron Deemer, president of DrFirst. “With the integration of iPrescribe and CRISP, doctors have a simple and complete view into their patients’ controlled substance history, which aids in determining appropriate care plans while avoiding risk of opioid addiction. Since prescribers can access the PDMP conveniently from their smartphones, they don’t have to be tethered to a computer throughout their day.”

    “Through our relationship with CRISP and the PDMP integration with DrFirst’s iPrescribe, we give Maryland prescribers the ability to more easily and efficiently comply with the PDMP query mandate. The improved access to patient data empowers physicians to make fully informed prescribing decisions, providing appropriate pain medication to patients who need it, and identify patients who are at risk for opioid addiction,” said Gene Ransom, MedChi’s chief executive officer. “Our goal is to put this tool in the hands of every prescriber in Maryland.”

    iPrescribe puts doctors in full control of the prescribing process. In addition to e-prescribing and PDMP access, iPrescribe delivers powerful medication management, including up to 24 months of a patient’s medication history; actual patient cost for prescribed medications from local pharmacies and discount card access to the uninsured; and secure chat with extended care teams and patients in a HIPAA-compliant manner. Prescriptions automatically update to the patient’s medication history to ensure consistent patient records across any EMR.  Integrations are available with most leading EMR and hospital information systems.

    About MedChi

    MedChi, The Maryland State Medical Society, is a non-profit membership association of Maryland physicians. It is the largest physician organization in Maryland. The mission of MedChi is to serve as Maryland’s foremost advocate and resource for physicians, their patients, and the public health of Maryland. For more information, please visit www.medchi.org.

    About DrFirst

    DrFirst, the nation’s leading provider of e-prescribing, price transparency, and medication management solutions, enables stakeholders across the healthcare industry to use comprehensive real-time data and connectivity to increase their patient safety ratings, efficiency, and profitability. Today, more than 220,000 healthcare professionals, 105,000 prescribers, 67,000 pharmacies, 1,000+ acute care facilities, 21,000+ ambulatory care facilities, and more than 300 electronic health record (EHR) and pharmacy system vendors depend on DrFirst’s innovative software solutions to improve clinical workflows, expedite secure collaboration across a patient’s care team, and drive better health outcomes. The company’s integrated technologies include its award-winning electronic prescribing platform, the most comprehensive medication history available, clinically specialized secure messaging, and patient medication adherence monitoring and benefits checking. Also, DrFirst was the first to offer e-prescribing for controlled substances (EPCS) and is considered the industry standard for providers nationwide. For more information, please visit www.drfirst.com or connect with us @DrFirst.  

    DrFirst Media Contact:
    Jenn Cohen
    Amendola Communications
    404-759-3933
    [email protected]

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • Optimum Healthcare IT Completes Epic Go-Live at North Mississippi Health Services

    Successful Project Advances Care in the Communities Served

    July 16, 2019 – Optimum Healthcare IT, a Best in KLAS healthcare staffing and consulting services firm, announced today that on May 10, 2019, the firm completed training and go-live of the Epic electronic health record (EHR) system at North Mississippi Health Services(NMHS) in Tupelo, MS. The organization went live on Epic across its regional network of primary and specialty clinics and nursing homes, as well as for its telehealth services.

    Classroom training started in December 2018, with Optimum conducting 450 classes that trained approximately 3000 end-users and 390 super users. Through the use of Optimum’s proprietary tool, Skillmarket®, Optimum staffed ten highly skilled Epic Credentialed Trainers (CTs) who coordinated the training. Also, along with executive oversight, Optimum deployed 100 at-the-elbow resources to support go-live readiness.

    North Mississippi Health Services serves a large community, and we are honored to have been part of the project to provide better care coordination for both patients and providers, said Rebecca Manne, Executive Vice President of Optimum Healthcare IT. The amount of work that NMHS put into this project was impressive, and their community will benefit greatly from it. We are very proud of the partnership we formed.

    Optimum Healthcare IT offers highly-rated KLAS training and activation services to assist healthcare organizations in bringing their EHR systems live, and ensuring users are fully trained and supported throughout their strategic initiatives. Optimum can customize our offering to fit the needs of your organization. Whether it is a phased approach or a big-bang go-live, our leadership, training, and support experts are ready to provide the best solutions and services the industry has to offer. With our staff, methodology, and tools, Optimum has the experience to organize, schedule, and manage any size go-live.

    Our vision with Epic was to promote better care coordination for patients and providers, said Jim Weldon, NMHS CIO. We found a partner in Optimum Healthcare IT that we could trust to guide us in our decisions and be able to take full advantage of lessons learned and experiences gained through prior training and go-live projects. The partnership resulted in a successful go-live with a fully trained staff that enables us to serve our communities better.

    About North Mississippi Health Services
    North Mississippi Health Services is dedicated to being the provider of the best patient- and family-centered care. NMHS connects patients and their families with convenient access to care that is cost efficient and of the highest quality. NMHS provides acute, diagnostic, therapeutic, and emergency services, with the sole level II trauma center in our service area, through North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo. The health care system also includes community hospital locations in Amory, Eupora, Luka, Pontotoc and West Point, Miss., and Hamilton Ala., a regional network of more than 45 primary and specialty clinics; nursing homes and telehealth services.

    NMHS serves 24 counties in north Mississippi and northwest Alabama from headquarters in Tupelo, Miss. NMHS is a 2012 recipient of the prestigious Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, and NMMC, its flagship hospital, is a 2006 Baldrige Award recipient.

    About Skillmarket
    Optimum Healthcare IT has created SkillMarket, a software platform designed to automate multiple processes that are critical to a successful go-live. Gone are the days of managing complex and dynamic go-live environments with spreadsheets and out-of-date technologies.  Skillmarket addresses and eliminates many of the common issues that lead to double- or triple-booked consultants, missed departments, last minute scheduling, and under-supported staff.

    About Optimum Healthcare IT
    Optimum Healthcare IT is a Best in KLAS healthcare IT staffing and consulting services firm based in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. Optimum provides world-class professional staffing services to fill any need as well as consulting services that encompass advisory, EHR implementation, training and activation, EHR optimization, community connect, managed services, enterprise resource planning, security, and ancillary services – supporting our client’s needs through the continuum of care. Our organization is led by a leadership team with extensive experience in providing expert healthcare staffing and consulting solutions to all types of organizations.

    Visit www.optimumhit.com or call 1.904.373.0831 to find out how your organization can take advantage of our solution offerings.

    MEDIA CONTACT
    Larry Kaiser
    VP of Marketing
    [email protected]

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • We Need Your Help to Combat the Opioid Epidemic

    7.16.2019
    By Bill Cioffi, CIO, Healdsburg District Hospital
    Andy Smith, President, Impact Advisors 

    The CHIME Opioid Task Force launched an educational webinar series last year to share health IT-based practices that have shown progress at curbing the opioid crisis. The webinars, which are free and open to the public, have been well received and number among some of CHIME’s best attended online educational events. This year the task force wants to expand our offerings, and as the co-chairs of the educational subcommittee, we are asking our Foundation partners to help. 

    Many CHIME Foundation members are working with their provider clients to develop, roll out and sustain programs that address the opioid epidemic. There are many facets to the opioid problem, and many strategies to solve it. For instance, previous webinars have shown how healthcare systems used their IT resources to first benchmark opioid prescribing patterns, identify over–prescribers in their organizations and then collaborate with clinicians to reduce unnecessary prescribing. This has led to fewer patients exposed to opioids and narrowed the pipeline of prescription drugs that might be misused. Other webinars have explored ways to flag patients who are addicted or at risk of addiction and then support them. 

    The Opioid Task Force is looking for examples of partnerships between Foundation firms and healthcare organizations that have real-world results of successfully tackling the opioid epidemic. These examples can touch on any part of the challenge, from prevention to treatment to long-term care. The content should be tailored for CIOs and CMIOs and should highlight IT’s role in creating solutions. Our goal is to conduct a webinar monthly and build a resource for the healthcare community.  

    We will take advantage of CHIME’s expertise and existing resources to hold the webinar series. The proposal submission criteria are similar to CHIME’s College LIVE webinars; instructions are available here. For selecting proposals, we will apply the CHIME Fall CIO Forum’s track sessions guidelines, which strongly recommend including a CHIME member as a presenter. If you are partnering with a provider on an opioid project but not sure they are a CHIME member, ask the CHIME team to help you find out. Once a proposal is accepted, the CHIME team will work with presenters on scheduling, formatting and other logistics. 

    The Opioid Task Force welcomes the chance to share your success stories. If you have any questions, please email [email protected].

    More Foundation Insight:

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • Design Engaging In-Person Focus Groups

    7.16.2019
    By Arika Lycan, Director, Corporate Partner Services

    Buzz is beginning to spread across the CHIME Foundation about the In-Person Focus Groups that will take place at CHIME19 Fall CIO Forum, Nov. 4 and 5 at 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. in Phoenix. Foundation partners are currently able to select the date(s) and time(s) to hold these sessions. As you begin to think of titles, abstracts and your focus group structure, take in some of these resources for planning and implementing successful In-Person Focus Groups. 

    In-Person Focus Groups represent a key way for your team to connect and engage with CHIME CIOs, CMIOS and CNIOs, and realize the full potential of your Foundation membership.  

    Characteristics of all Foundation Focus Groups: 

    • 90 minutes in length 
    • 10-12 CHIME member participants 
    • Should be focused on a topic that is of high interest to the CHIME members 
    • CHIME team will be on-site to assist with logistics 
    • Snacks and refreshments will be available before/after session for participants 
    • Ability to record is available for an addition cost 

    Elements of a Successful Focus Group: 

    • Set expectations of attentiveness and participation at the top of the session 
    • Share stated goals and objectives with attendees 
    • Achieve a blend of context-setting, information sharing and discussion 
    • Allot plenty of time to listen to CHIME members 
    • Allow CHIME members to learn and connect with each other 

    “Have your audience interact with each other. You can be the conductor, let them create the music,” said Cyndi Cahill, senior vice president of Atos Digital Health, during her session, “Conducting an Engaging Partner Conversation” at CPES18. Create an environment that will encourage discussion between participants. This generates lots of thoughtful ideas.  

    Through Insight and CHIMEcentral.org, we’ve shared a number of helpful past articles and resources that give you the information you need to be best prepared to host your Focus Group.  

    Focus Group planning and implementation resources include: 

      
    The CHIME Foundation team is here to support you on your journey to Focus Group success. Reach out to us at any point along the way should you have questions.

    More Foundation Insight:

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • CHIME Foundation Poised to Bring Enhanced Value through New Structure

    7.16.219
    By Jennifer Ramstrom, VP, CHIME Foundation and CHIME Technologies, Inc.

    Dear CHIME Foundation Partners, 

    I am excited to share an enhancement to the CHIME Foundation organizational structure. Previewed during our Foundation Luncheon at HIMSS this spring, this realignment was developed to better meet the needs of you, our Foundation partners, by providing a single point of contact to ensure optimal utilization of your member benefits and other products and programs exclusively available through CHIME. 

    In June, we finalized the implementation of our National Account Management structure. Foundation partners now have an assigned, dedicated account director. Jessica Hadley, Caitlin Kelly and Rebecca Scholten have all taken on the newly created role of business development director. Caitlin, Rebecca, and Jessica each have an assigned U.S. territory and Rebecca is also managing our partners in Canada.  This new structure will allow us to better understand each of your organization’s offerings, business models and unique strategies as it relates to your growth within the healthcare market. With the intended goal of bringing incremental value to our partnerships, we have already experienced deeper, more strategic conversations with you, our business partners, and an enhanced level of engagement through this new model. 

    Many needs can be met by wielding and capitalizing on the suite of Foundation benefits provided to you through your membership. The Business Development team will work closely with our new Corporate Partner Services team, charged with supporting, implementing and concluding benefits related activity for your organization. The Corporate Partner Services team is led by Arika Lycan, corporate partner services director and includes Chris Hargrett, associate, CHIME Foundation, and Erin Waggoner, specialist, AEHIS/T/A Foundations as well as our Foundation intern, Charles Russell. Rounding out the Foundation structure is Rose Lucas, executive assistant, CHIME Foundation, who provides administrative operations support for our team. 

    The entire CHIME Foundation team will continue to be guided by CHIME Foundation Chief Operating Officer Barb Sivek and me. We are excited for this next chapter in the CHIME Foundation’s journey and are thankful to have loyal CHIME Foundation partners, like you, by our side, fueling our growth and progress.  

    We look forward to your feedback as we continue to implement this new structure and we will keep you abreast of other enhancements as we move down the path of Foundation 2.0. 

    Thank you for your partnership. 

    Best, 

    Jennifer 

    More Foundation Insight:

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • Quick Notes

    7.16.2019
    By Chris     Hargrett, Membership Associate

    Policymakers encourage health IT leaders to weigh in: Four members of Congress and several representatives from federal agencies offered advice for how CHIME and CHIME Foundation members can help shape public policies during the second annual CHIME Advocacy Summit in late June. Learn more here and visit our photo gallery here. 

    CPES19 Hotel block closes Aug. 5: Have you registered for CPES19 and made your hotel reservation? Take advantage of the CHIME room rate and reserve your hotel room before Aug. 5. After this date, rooms are available on a space-available only basis! Learn more and secure your spot here. 

    Title and abstracts deadline passed for In-Person Focus Groups: The titles and abstracts for the CHIME19 Fall In-Person Focus Group were due on July 15. Registered CHIME members to the Fall Forum will have access to select their session preferences. Click here to enter your title and abstract or contact your account director. 

    More Foundation Insight:

    Posted 7.16.2019

  • MDabstract Joins The College Of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) As Foundation Partner

    Jacksonville, FL, July 11, 2019 – MDabstract, the leading EHR discrete data abstraction and migration service, is pleased to announce that it has joined the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) Foundation as a Standard member. CHIME’s mission to advance and serve healthcare leaders through the utilization of knowledge and technology aligns with MDabstract’s commitment to support healthcare organizations using clinical information systems to improve the lives of their patients. As a CHIME Foundation member firm, MDabstract will play a vital role in CHIME’s continuing education efforts and have opportunities to interact with leading healthcare executives and thought leaders.

    “Joining the CHIME Foundation is just another step towards MDabstract being in a position to offer the best solutions and services to our ever expanding list of clients”, said Mark Masters, President & CEO of MDabstract. “This is an exciting partnership for us; sharing a space with CIO’s and other senior healthcare IT leaders will allow us to have a pulse on the real-time needs of America’s leading healthcare organizations as well as ensure that our solutions are easily accessible to all CHIME members.”

    MDabstract is looking forward to participating in CHIME’s upcoming CIO Fall Forum and collaborating with its membership to explore how our extensive EHR expertise and discrete data solutions can best meet their evolving needs.

    About MDabstract
    MDabstract is the leading manual abstraction and data migration solution that helps healthcare organizations across the country with EHR implementation, discrete data entry, electronic filing and quality reporting. With 200+ successful partnerships, MDabstract has certified clinical abstractors with expertise in over 25 medical specialties and experience in more than 20 different medical record platforms.  Having migrated or mined over 2.4 Million pieces of data in 2018 alone, MDabstract provides clients with a level of data quality and measurable cost savings that set us apart from other solutions. For more information, please visit mdabstract.com.

    About CHIME Foundation
    The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) Foundation is a non-profit organization composed of select healthcare IT companies and professional services firms. CHIME Foundation members benefit from the unique opportunity to partner and collaborate with CHIME member chief information officers. The CHIME Foundation provides and participates in educational initiatives and programs that serve the professional development needs of CHIME and CHIME Foundation members. These initiatives and partnerships advance the strategic and innovative applications of healthcare information technology.

    About CHIME
    The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) is an executive organization dedicated to serving chief information officers (CIOs), chief medical information offices (CMIOs), chief nursing information officers (CNIOs) and other senior healthcare IT leaders. With more than 2,900 members in 55 countries and over 150 healthcare IT companies and professional services firms, CHIME provides a highly interactive, trusted environment enabling senior professional and industry leaders to collaborate; exchange best practices; address professional development needs; and advocate the effective use of information management to improve the health and care in the communities they serve. For more information, please visit chimecentral.org.

    Posted 7.11.2019

  • Q&A: How One Innovation Workshop Attendee Puts Lessons into Practice


    7.11.19
    Candace Stuart – Director, Communications & Public Relations

    Reid Stephan, vice president and CIO at St. Luke’s Health System in Boise, Idaho, was among a small group of healthcare leaders to participate in CHIME Innovation’s inaugural workshop, “Developing an Innovation Framework.” In this Q&A, he discusses lessons learned and how he is applying them to spur innovation at St. Luke’s. This article was edited for brevity.   

    Q: When you think of innovation, what does that mean to you?

    RS: I have debates all the time internally. Most folks who I talk to about innovation think it is the next new moonshot, something no one has ever done before. But for me, it is relative. For St. Luke’s, five years ago the majority of our staff still did paper timecards. For us, it was innovative to move to an electronic timecard system (but this is) not innovative for, say, a Microsoft.

    I have the mindset of start where you are. Don’t try to benchmark against some company like Amazon. Look around you and think about what we are doing. Innovation can be as simple as taking an existing workflow and modifying it so it is better for the provider, for the patient, for the employee. That can be innovative. I have a maybe lower-level definition for the word innovation than others. One of the things we struggle with is a common vocabulary so we can really have a meaningful dialogue about innovation.

    Q: After attending the workshop, did your concept of what innovation is change?

    RS: No. It reinforced it. What I experienced there was probably the most practical day-and-a-half workshop/conference that I have ever attended. I found the approach very refreshing. I worried that I would leave there and we would have just spent a day and a half at a 50,000-foot view pontificating about what innovation is, having people talk about things they are doing that are innovative, which is interesting. But it doesn’t then let me come back to my job and immediately apply something or immediately be able to take some action and formulate some momentum in a certain area.

    What I enjoyed the most about this CHIME workshop was that there was a practical framework and approach built around this idea of innovation. It wasn’t anything that CHIME or Intermountain developed on their own. It was taking some proven best practices from different industries and thought leaders and piecing those together in a way that I found very accessible. It was easy for me to start to, in my mind, think through how I would take this back to my team, share with them what I felt and learned at the workshop and get them as excited about it as I was. That has been the case. It was very easy to take that and apply that to my environment.

    Q: I don’t think of innovation as the new shiny object. I think of innovation as a creative way to look at the world, to take existing resources and leverage them. So, when you talk about the workshop itself, would it be fair to argue it is innovative on those grounds?

    RS: Absolutely. I attend a variety of conferences and meetings. … It is rare that I leave an event like that with something  I feel I have in hand, where I feel I can go back and make a few tweaks, where I have a quasi-operating model that I can really start to work on. I felt I was offered this ala carte menu where I could pick some things that I could immediately share with my team and get started quickly on a journey of, at St. Luke’s, how do we operationalize this so IT can start to facilitate and lead conversations around innovation.

    Where we miss the mark, and I don’t think we are unique, is we will have operations or clinical folks come to us with a solution in hand. The problem with that approach is you miss that fundamental first step of, what is the problem you are trying to solve, what is the job to be done? Let’s be curious together to figure out what it is we are trying to do that will then lead to a much more likely successful innovation.

    We have a lot of supply-driven innovation ideas. Someone goes to a conference, someone attends a webinar, someone listens to a vendor, and they go, “This is a cool solution.” Figure out how we fit that into our environment vs. looking at the demand-driven innovation. Those are the things we are trying to do. Once you have defined that, then go and look for: Do we own something already that can do this? Is there an existing workflow? Is this net new? The workshop helped provide a good framework – and we are still working through it – to put together a working model that we think will resonate and provide a repeatable process, a common language, that anyone in our health system can operate within.

    Q: Can you give an example of what you are applying from what you learned?

    RS: I can share from the last couple of months what we have done internally. I have taken my team of direct reports and we did a day offsite and spent our time going through what was taught and learned at the CHIME workshop. Then I started to have conversations with my peers and other executives in the system, framing out, “Here is the challenge I see.” That has completely resonated with them.

    We are going to hold a daylong workshop Aug. 1 where we will invite all of our project managers across the system, all of our business analysts, some key clinical operators, some business operators, and we will introduce this framework. It has been great to see how well this has been received. People recognize that this is a challenge. They recognize that it leads to a lot of frustrations because someone brings forward what they think is a good idea and oftentimes it squanders in committee; nothing ever happens. Or you get someone who by sheer force of will, personality, reputation, is able to push something through but once it is implemented it never quite measures up to what they thought it would.

    Here’s a way we can go into it, making sure we can clearly understand there is a job we are trying to do and the problem to solve. How will we measure that we are being successful? We will iterate and have rapid experimentation. We will prove out and test hypotheses and we will start and stop things quickly based on that. People love that idea. No longer will it be a “I am going to have an idea and in 12-18 months maybe we will have some funding, and something will get delivered, a prototype.” This will align nicely with our internal governance model. As something gets prioritized and sequenced, then within a matter of weeks we will be able to prove this will or won’t work. As we prove it works, we will be able to move much more quickly in a sort of agile methodology to deliver on that need.

    The hope is coming out of the Aug. 1 meeting we will really start to train and build our acumen around this kind of framework going into our fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1. We will create budget in our IT budget for innovation so as people bring forward ideas, we will have not a huge amount initially, but a bucket of funds we can use to prototype, test, prove a hypothesis, in that rapid-cycle methodology.

    Q: Some people might think of innovation as I can take 5G and I can do X, Y and Z. It sounds like what you are doing is really building a culture.  

    RS: We are trying to innovate how we approach innovation. One of the unique projects might be around 5G or advanced machine learning. Who knows? But we will have this clear, repeatable, well-understood process for how we approach those things so that no matter where the idea comes from, we are doing the same (process) across the board. If we do this right, it will also help minimize people who go off and do their own shadow thing. In some cases, they are able to do an end run-around procurement and other things. Before we know it, someone has stood up a business service or a business application that is not connected. It doesn’t have the right support or maturity around it. This will help to create the right intake process to avoid those kinds of shadow innovation activities.

    Q: Is there anything you would have changed about the workshop?         

    RS: No. I thought it was a good pace. I thought it was a good cadence and variety of presentations but also hands-on at a whiteboard working with your peers on what you were just taught about or was discussed. I wouldn’t add more to it or make it longer. That day-and-a-half timeframe is perfect. It is a nice bite-size amount that I could then recreate and share with others.

    I would say there is a potential for a 200-level workshop that might dive a bit deeper because in some of these areas we did kind of just waterski. So maybe a 200-level workshop to snorkel or scuba dive in would be great. I think this is the first one that (CHIME Innovation) had done. I was impressed with how well it was done for that beta experience. It was perfect.

    Editor’s note: CHIME Innovation will hold the second in the series with “Innovation Strategy – Launch & Execution” on July 25-26 in Salt Lake City. The workshop is designed for CIOs, health IT executives and innovation executives. You can learn more here. Registration information is available here.

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    Posted 7.11.2019

  • Congressional Leaders Encourage CIOs to Share Views on Policies


    7.11.19
    Candace Stuart – Director, Communications & Public Relations

    Health IT executives: Washington needs your help.

    That message rang loud and clear from both sides of the aisle and across federal agencies at the second annual CHIME Advocacy Summit on June 26-28 in Washington, D.C. Whether it is providing supporting data, sharing anecdotes, responding to requests for information or taking the ultimate step of becoming a politician, CIOs and other health IT leaders can help shape policies affecting telehealth, cybersecurity, interoperability and the opioid epidemic.

    “We are still lacking cost-effectiveness data,” said U.S. Rep. Doris Matsui, D-CA, author of the bipartisan Excellence in Mental Health Act and sponsor or co-sponsor of numerous bills promoting telehealth, cybersecurity and the use of 5G. Although there has been some progress recently, reimbursement for telehealth visits has been stymied without data that shows telehealth lowers costs and improves quality – or at least is on par with in-person care. “I need your support going forward,” she said.

    U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte, R-MT, echoed Matsui’s request. A strong proponent of telehealth to serve his largely rural constituency, he pointed to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) as a hurdle that health IT leaders could help overcome. CBO has voiced concerns that more accessibility to healthcare through telehealth will increase use and therefore costs. That calculation doesn’t account for savings from alternative choices such as costly emergency room visits. “We need to educate CBO so they can score properly,” he said.

    U.S. Rep. Bill Foster received a round of applause for co-sponsoring an amendment to eliminate a ban on a unique national patient identifier. The House approved the amendment in June and now the Senate must follow suit for the issue to go forward. The 20-year prohibition is seen as a barrier to interoperability and a risk to patient safety.

    Foster offered an example that illustrated that risk: a passenger who experienced cardiac arrest on a flight that then was diverted to land and get emergency care. The provider misidentified the passenger as DNR – a person who had a Do Not Resuscitate order – and the passenger subsequently died. Foster encouraged the audience to provide other examples that highlight the consequences of not having a unique patient identifier. “This is a painful subject for you, but go into medical errors,” he said.

    U.S. Rep. Bill Johnson, R-OH, and the sponsor of several telehealth bills, offered the prospective of a former CIO. A retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force, he served as director of the Air Force’s Chief Information Officer Staff at U.S. Special Operations Command followed by four years as a CIO for a global manufacturing company. He cited the many benefits of telehealth, including telestroke services, virtual surgical support and remote care for people dealing with opioid addiction. He recommended health IT leaders “talk in a way people can understand” when advocating for change and added that the audience members should consider running for office to make an even greater impact on policy.

    Policymakers from numerous federal agencies also offered advice for shaping policies. Michelle Schreiber, MD, director of the Quality Measurement and Value-Based Incentives Group at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), urged the audience to read proposed rules, respond to RFIs and provide practical, real-world recommendations for operationalizing the proposed rules. “Read the RFIs and look at the questions,” she advised. “The questions are signals.” CMS reviews the comments and can be influenced by compelling responses, she said.

    Admiral Brett P. Giroir, MD, assistant secretary for health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), called on the audience to use their expertise and insights to help address the opioid epidemic. As senior adviser to the Secretary for Opioid Policy, he is responsible for coordinating HHS’s efforts across the administration to fight America’s opioid crisis. Existing technologies like EMRs, dashboards, clinical decision support tools and data analytics already are proving useful for monitoring prescribing and reducing patients’ exposure to opioids, he noted. With improvements in interoperability, health IT-based tools may help to track children who have been exposed to opioids in the womb to provide long-term care and support, he suggested. In the meantime, he urged the audience to share stories of what worked and what didn’t with HHS.

    The second annual CHIME Advocacy Summit, which was held in Washington, D.C., included presenters from Congress, CMS, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Federal Trade Commission, the Office for Civil Rights and other agencies. Presenters included members of CHIME’s Policy Steering Committee and the CHIME Opioid Task Force. The event concluded with visits to Capitol Hill, where participating CHIME members met with their congressional staff to advocate on behalf of CHIME and for CHIME’s policy priorities.

    Editor’s note: This article previously was published in Health Data Management. More information about CHIME’s public policy priorities and advocacy work is available here. CHIME members and members of CHIME Foundation firms who want to get more involved in healthcare IT policy can email [email protected].

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    Posted 7.11.2019

  • News of Note


    7.11.19
    Candace Stuart – Director, Communications & Public Relations

    Less than a week to get the early bird discount for CHIME19: The early bird rate to attend the 2019 CHIME Fall CIO Forum expires after July 17. CHIME19 will be Nov. 3-6 in Phoenix. Check out the agenda, speakers, hotel and more here.  To register, go here.

    Board nominations being taken though July 19: Have you ever aspired to serve on the Board of Trustees? CHIME is accepting nominations for the 2020 Board through July 19. Elected members will run for one of three openings on the CHIME Board, and serve a three-year term beginning Jan. 1, 2020. Go here to review nomination criteria, responsibilities and the application process. 

    Here’s your chance to be a 2019 award winner: Let your peers know about your accomplishments in 2019. CHIME is accepting nominations for awards honoring members who have demonstrated leadership, innovation and collaboration. The deadline to apply is July 29. Learn more here.

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    Posted 7.11.2019

  • New Spok Survey Reveals Most Clinicians Believe Technology and Workload are the Top Contributors to Clinician Burnout

    The No. 1 obstacle to seeking help for symptoms of burnout is lack of institutional attention and resources

    SPRINGFIELD, VA – July 10, 2019 – Spok, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Spok Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: SPOK) and a global leader in healthcare communications, announced new findings regarding clinician burnout. More than 470 clinical staff at U.S. hospitals and health systems responded to the Spok-administered survey, which measures clinician perception of burnout. The survey also sought to identify if organizations are implementing solutions proposed in the 2019 paper: A Crisis in Healthcare: A Call to Action on Physician Burnout. Key findings confirm that clinicians think burnout is a “public health crisis,” yet many report their organizations are not implementing recommended strategies to address it.

    When asked whether increased or ineffective technology contributes to the risk of clinician burnout, the vast majority (90% of all respondents) strongly or moderately agreed. And 89% of respondents said burdensome or increased workload (not related to direct patient care) is the biggest factor that contributes to this risk.

    Despite these concerns, when asked what prevents clinicians from seeking help for potential symptoms of burnout, the No. 1 obstacle cited by respondents (65%) was that their organization lacks institutional attention and resources. When asked how often their organization leaders discuss burnout, 47% said rarely or never.

    “Clinician burnout is a complicated issue. The phrase is often used to capture associated symptoms like occupational stress, depression, moral injury, and many other terms,” explains Teresa Niblett, RN-BC, director of clinical informatics at Peninsula Regional Medical Center and member of the Spok nursing advisory council. “The pursuit of the triple aim—improving care experiences, bettering the health of populations, and reducing the costs of healthcare—results in many variables that increase pressures on healthcare workers. I am not surprised 92% of clinicians in this survey called burnout a public health crisis. It validates expanding the triple aim to a quadruple aim by adding the goal to reduce clinician burden.”

    The Crisis in Healthcare paper, published by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the Harvard Global Health Institute, the Massachusetts Medical Society, and the Massachusetts Health and Hospital Association, suggests three solutions to reduce the risk of clinical burnout: support proactive mental health treatment and support, improve EHR usability, and appoint an executive-level chief wellness officer.

    Approximately 40% of the respondents indicated that none of these strategies are being implemented at their organizations. Only 30% of respondents said their organizations are improving EHR usability, 20% reported mental health treatment or support is available, and 13% have a chief wellness officer or equivalent. The survey asked the clinicians if the suggested solutions could help address the risk of burnout in their own organizations. A resounding 95% believe improving EHR usability will be at least somewhat helpful.

    “The insights from this survey reinforce the complexity of addressing clinician burnout,” said Vincent D. Kelly, president and chief executive officer of Spok Holdings, Inc. “There is not one easy or clear path for healthcare leaders to turn the tide on this pressing issue. Our commitment at Spok is to continue to be a partner with healthcare organizations to ease their communication challenges in an increasingly fast-paced care environment so they can focus more where they want: on providing patient care.”

    The full results of the survey can be found at www.Spok.com/clinicianburnout.

    Becker’s Hospital Review will be hosting a webinar on the survey results on Aug. 8, 2019 at 12 p.m. CDT. Registration is now open.

    About Spok 
    Spok, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Spok Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: SPOK), headquartered in Springfield, Virginia, is proud to be a global leader in healthcare communications. We deliver clinical information to care teams when and where it matters most to improve patient outcomes. Top hospitals rely on the Spok Care Connect® platform to enhance workflows for clinicians, support administrative compliance, and provide a better experience for patients. Our customers send over 100 million messages each month through their Spok® solutions. Spok is making care collaboration easier. For more information, visit spok.com or follow @spoktweets on Twitter.

    Spok is a trademark of Spok Holdings, Inc. Spok Care Connect is a trademark of Spok, Inc.

    Contacts
    Jill Asby 
    +1 (952) 230-5363 
    [email protected]

    Posted 7.10.2019
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