Beyond Medical Informatics

It’s been over a month since I last written for the blog.

My life as a CIO has been very busy. The past few weeks much more so. Some of my recent activities (I’ll write about them soon) include:

• Continuing development and design of TMC PRIME—the EMR platform we are developing.
• TMC Quality Fair Week where we had a booth that featured TMC PRIME.
• Implementation of Google Apps—Yes, TMC is now on GMail!
• Initial wrap-up of 2011 projects for Year-To-Date IT accomplishments (in preparation for budget planning).
• Initial project planning for next year’s budget.
• Initial brainstorming for restructuring of IT Department.

The last one has been in my mind for several months now—probably since I started work as CIO. I found our IT organizational structure to be rigid and unwieldy. I had a hard time responding to critical IT requirements and situations. Projects were not managed or monitored well. Some projects slip through the cracks of proper implementation.

Then it dawned on me. For several years, the main IT project was the hospital information system (SHAMAN). This system started out small but has since become the workhorse of hospital operations. And the IT department was almost exclusively organized around this application—to the detriment of other IT projects.

I shared this with my IT managers:

We have an IT department that is structured to support a single software.

That can’t be. We need to change that. We have other IT projects aside from SHAMAN, like:

• HL7 Integration Platform
• Clinical Data Repository Platform
• Clinical Documentation Platform
• Business Intelligence
• Document Management Systems

Our users also have other IT plans like:

• Improved charge capturing using mobile devices
• Improved medication management
• Online surveys and patient feedback forms
• Research and patient registries

So, I pose this challenge to my IT management team.

Let’s build an IT organization that supports the whole organization including the network of clinics and hospitals we serve.

It will not be easy. Our initial thoughts focus on the following areas:

• Strengthen the IT management team with focus on strategic planning, initiatives and relationship-building.
• Build project management and systems analysis core competencies among the staff.
• Build technical core competencies for the core technologies used.
• If possible, outsource some IT services, e.g. technical support, specialized programming.

Let’s hope we succeed.

Next year will be an exciting year!

Related posts:

1. HIT Idea: 5-year Strategic Health IT Plan
2. The TMC IT Department Prayer