This week, we've joined our health IT colleagues in celebrating U.S. National Health IT Week (NHIT Week) – a yearly event dedicated to raising awareness of how our industry is advancing healthcare. From virtual meetups to live events in Washington, D.C. and beyond, industry stakeholders shared actionable outcomes that demonstrate the essential role of health IT. Their discussions centered around one theme: catalyzing change.
Here at Nordic, we took this theme to heart – shining a spotlight on our consultants, colleagues, and client and industry partners who are making a difference in the lives of healthcare providers and the patients they serve. Throughout the week, you may have seen our social posts featuring stories and video about these change agents. In case you missed it, here is a roundup of some of our top NHIT Week highlights.
Change through end-user education
In this NHIT Week video, Lauren Griessmeyer, director of training strategy, discusses how she’s helping healthcare organizations catalyze change through end-user education. She aims to empower our client partners by developing training programs that go hand-in-hand with support. Lauren’s goal is to change the way organizations think about training – helping them view education and support as one continuum.
Change through client partner innovation
It’s inspiring to partner with provider organizations that are truly catalyzing change in health IT through the innovative work that they do. Helping these organizations solve their toughest IT and business challenges is what drives us to come to work each day. On our social media channels, we featured some client partner projects that we’ve had the privilege of supporting: Bellin Health’s extension of ThedaCare’s EHR and Loma Linda’s Community Connect implementation.
Change through industry collaboration
Provider satisfaction and the opioid epidemic are among the top challenges facing the healthcare industry nationwide. To help address these challenges, health IT organizations, leaders, and stakeholders have recently come together to launch two important initiatives:
KLAS Arch Collaborative
Provider satisfaction is impacting many areas of healthcare, and health IT is no exception. According to a recent national survey by The Doctors Company, 61 percent of physicians say EHR systems reduce clinical efficiency. The survey suggests that physicians view EHR systems as a source of frustration rather than a useful tool.
To improve EHR usability and satisfaction among providers and physicians, KLAS launched The Arch Collaborative. This initiative is helping healthcare organizations, vendors, and other stakeholders collaborate through best practice reports, webinars, and participation at a yearly conference.
Nordic was one of three consulting firms invited to participate in this initiative. We’re committed to leveraging The Arch Collaborative’s research to help our client partners improve physician satisfaction and get the most from their EHR investment.
CHIME Opioid Task Force
To help stem the opioid epidemic, CHIME has formed a task force aimed at using technology to address opioid addiction. Our CEO, Bruce Cerullo, serves on this task force alongside fellow health IT leaders, who are focused on harnessing the talent and knowledge of CHIME members to build an evidence base and inform opioid public policy.
These efforts by CHIME and other healthcare organizations are starting to make an impact on legislation. Recently, the Senate passed the final version of an opioid bill that will help create and expand programs and policies that address different aspects of the opioid epidemic, including prevention, treatment, and recovery.
***
It has been a great week to take a step back and focus on ways that health IT is catalyzing change in healthcare. How did you celebrate NHIT Week? Share your #NHITWeek stories with us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, or Twitter.