ADDRESSING WORK FORCE NEEDS CRITICAL TO HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SUCCESS

Chicago, November 14—The current lack of a comprehensive plan for training the healthcare work force to use new technologies is a potentially serious rate-limiting factor in the adoption and effective use of electronic health records (EHR) and other health IT tools, warns a group of experts gathered last week at the first-ever Work Force for Health Information Transformation: A Strategy Summit in Washington, DC.

“With work force shortages looming over the next several decades, healthcare needs to look at new ways to recruit, train, and retain workers who can effectively use new technologies to improve patient care and watch the bottom line,” says Laura Ginsburg of the Office of Apprenticeship Training, Employer and Labor Services, U.S. Department of Labor – ETA.

The summit—co-sponsored by the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) and the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA)—brought together public and private stakeholders from academia, professional associations, provider and payer organizations, business, industry, and government to develop a roadmap for how the industry can build a trained work force to implement and support health information systems.

Some of the key challenges identified by the group include a lack of awareness regarding the scope and urgency of work force training needs, disagreement on the core skill set needed, insufficient economic motivation to change education, and a lack of ownership for funding training programs.

“If we collectively seek to create a healthcare system that is safe, efficient, timely, patient centered, equitable, and effective, then every time you invest in technology, you must also invest in people to use this technology wisely and well,” adds Charles Safran, MD, AMIA Chairman.

Some immediate recommendations from the group are:

• Use emerging common definition of an EHR to drive work force training plans.
• Define core skills so that education can accommodate multiple roles and areas of healthcare practice.
• Integrate IT competencies throughout the professional education of all healthcare workers.
• Find sources of funding to support training so healthcare employees aren’t forced to bear the cost burden to improve and update skills.
• Create awareness among technology-oriented students about careers in health information management (HIM), informatics and health IT.
• Educate the public about new technologies and demystify the healthcare process for increasingly empowered patients.

“While new technology promises much improvement in healthcare delivery, a workforce with the knowledge of how to best use these tools is needed,” said Mervat Abdelhak, PhD, RHIA, AHIMA President. “This means providing appropriate training and empowerment for healthcare employees in all care settings, as well as educating current and future students to work in an electronic environment.”

A full report from the summit will be made available to the industry in early 2006.

Work Force for Health Information Transformation: A Strategy Summit was supported in part by a grant to the Foundation of Research and Education (FORE) of AHIMA from Siemens Medical Solutions, USA Inc.

AHIMA is the premier association of HIM professionals. AHIMA's 52,000 members are dedicated to the effective management of personal health information needed to deliver quality healthcare to the public. Founded in 1928 to improve the quality of medical records, AHIMA is committed to advancing the HIM profession in an increasingly electronic and global environment through leadership in advocacy, education, certification, and lifelong learning. For information about the association, go to www.ahima.org.

AMIA is an organization of leaders shaping the future of health information technology in the Untied States and abroad. AMIA is dedicated to the development and application of medical informatics in support of patient care, teaching, research and healthcare administration. AMIA is the premier organization in the United States dedicated to the development and application of medical informatics in the support of patient care, teaching, research, and healthcare administration. Complete information about AMIA is available at www.amia.org.