101 - MUSEweb Orientation

Track: Other
Presenter: Brett Wangman    
Organization: MUSE International

Am I using all of the features on the MUSE website to maximize the value of my membership? Attend this session to learn how to navigate the website, and discover the valuable resources and tools available!

Learning objectives:

• Learn all the features on the MUSE website.
• Learn how to find solutions quickly.
• Learn how to network with other MUSE members.

Since 2018, Brett Wangman, Technology Director, has managed all of MUSE's member facing technologies including the website and members only community.

102 – Incorporating Clinical Trials into Expanse

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Tracy McCauley
Organization: Frederick Health, Frederick, Maryland

In oncology, the clinical trials department plays a crucial part in the care of the patient. They provide the patient with treatment opportunities that they would otherwise not have, so this makes it especially important for this are to be integrated into the electronic medical record. But with the comes many challenges not faced within other departments such as the constantly changing requirements of the patients care, frequent protocol changes, study blinding, and frequent tracking. At Frederick Health, we have been able to incorporate this area into Expanse allowing them to track and screen patients easily as well as chart the needed elements to maintain the clinical trials standards.

Learning objectives:

• The learner will understand the barriers to transitioning a Clinical Trials department to Expanse.
• The learner will understand the way in which registries can help a clinical trials department with screening oncology patients.
• The learner will understand the way in which Care Compass can track clinical trial patients.

Tracy McCauley has worked at Frederick Health for the last six years in the Oncology department, first as an Oncology Nurse Navigator and now as the Oncology Analyst. As a navigator, she played a critical part in the move of the Oncology department from NexGen to Expanse. She then became the fulltime analyst for the Oncology Service Line. She is also highly involved with the early adoption of the genomics module and it currently transitioning the Clinical Trials department to Expanse.

104 – ARM – Eliminating the AMB Order Workaround

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Mallory Palmer
Organization: Tri Valley Health System, Cambridge, Nebraska

Ambulatory Orders have been a pain point for our providers since day one. We have expected providers to know what requires a pre-auth, what is typically denied by insurance, and what insurances cover which procedures in a specific setting. They want to enter an order and wait on results to come back. We are constantly trying to find small wins to get them back to just practicing medicine.

Tri Valley has been actively pursuing an Orders by Orders Build Strategy with MEDITECH's ARM module. Throughout our journey, we faced the obvious challenges, some quick wins and of course problems. We are excited to share our approach, build, quick wins, and lessons learned.

Learning objectives:

• Bridging the gap between the Ambulatory Order getting processed properly, avoiding pre-authorizations getting missed, patient care getting delayed, eliminating cumbersome workload task, and, most importantly, provider frustration.
• Lessons learned from an ARM Orders by Orders implementation with functionality and build/setup.
• Tips & tricks for parameter settings / EMR preferences that can be used today with/without ARM.

Mallory Palmer is a Clinical Informatics Representative at Tri Valley Health System in Cambridge, Nebraska. Her scope of responsibilities includes (but is not limited to) MEDITECH 2.2 Application Management/Support, Promoting Interoperability Management/Review, Staff/Provider Education, and ongoing MEDITECH enhancements/updates. Cambridge is a 20-bed CAH hospital that is using MEDITECH's full EHR integrated suite.

105 – Our Early Adopter Journey: Transport Module, IMO Core, PP52, ONC Genomics / Clinical Trials

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Lauren Small
Organization: Frederick Health, Frederick, Maryland

Frederick Health has partnered with MEDITECH to be Early Adopters for several projects. These include the new Mobile Transport Module, IMO Core/Problem List Enhancements, and Oncology Genomics/Clinical Trials. In order to do these, we became the Early Adopter for Priority Pack 52, moving from PP40 to 52. We will also discuss our Priority Pack Project Methodology.

Learning objectives:

• Become familiar with the benefits of being an Early Adopter for MEDITECH and your role and MEDITECH's role with an Early Adopter project.
• Learn how the new Transport module works and become familiar with the IMO Core Problem List Enhancements.
• Learn about Frederick Health’s Project Methodology and use of Teams for Priority Packs.

Lauren Small, MBA-ITM, BSN, RN has worked at Frederick Health (FH) for 24 years. She started her career at FH as a Pediatric RN. In 2002, she joined a newly formed EMR Team to build the Pediatric RN documentation in MEDITECH Magic when FH kicked off a nursing online documentation project. Over the next 22 years, she transitioned to the MD/RN MEDITECH Trainer, EDM Analyst, Clinical Applications Manager, and finally, IT Director of Applications in 2018.

106 – Discharge Lounge: Saving Minutes, to Save Hours, to Save Days

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Chris Neumann
Organization: Valley Health System, Paramus, New Jersey

With increased census and increased ED holds, the Valley Hospital was looking for solutions to free up bed capacity. Building on what other facilities had done, we designed a Discharge Lounge. This would be an area still within the hospital, but outside of the lobby where patients could wait for their ride. This allowed the patient room to be cleaned and made available earlier and gave patients a safe and comfortable place to wait. In this presentation, we will look at the workflow, technical build, and outcomes from that program.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how to setup a discharge lounge at your facility.
• Increase patient flow by freeing up bed space.
• Provide a safe and comfortable patient experience.

Chris Neumann has worked as a System Specialist with the Valley Health System since 2013. He was the project lead for Surveillance, Bed Management, EVS, Quality and Risk Management during Valley’s 2015 implementation of 6x.

107 – Ambulatory Patient Portal and Obesity Management Patient Accountability

Track: Patient Engagement
Presenters: Lona Kolman and Lane Helman
Organization: Wooster Community Hospital Health System, Wooster, Ohio

Patient portals can facilitate the digital delivery of immediate patient-provider communication to assist with accountability in obesity management patients. Wooster Community Hospital and Bloomington Medical Services stand by our mission to provide accessible, quality health care services to all people, to promote community wellness, and do so with compassion, dignity, and respect of the needs of those we serve. In efforts to uphold our mission, our Women's Care Providers have recently started an Obesity Management Program that focuses on nutritional plans, behavioral support, and activity interventions. 

This presentation will outline how attendees can utilize MEDITECH workflows to assist with the patient-provider accountability in a successful weight management journey. Attendees will be educated on ways of utilizing the patient portal to stay in constant communication with obesity management patients on their upcoming visits, simplifying provider workflows for re-occurring visits, and positive patient outcomes from our new obesity management program. Attendees will be shown portal utilization data and the positive impact it has had on our weight management patient population. With our newly started program we are anticipating numerous patients will have enrolled and sustained their clinical plan with their weight loss journey. 

Utilizing the digitalization of patient care with the MEDITECH Patient Portal is helping Wooster Community Hospital and Bloomington Medical Services Obesity Management patients take ownership and accountability in their personal journeys with weight loss.

Learning objectives:

• A process that will improve efficiencies in patient care is to send weekly questionnaires to patients via their portals to help identifies success and struggles that patients are having in their obesity management program prior to their visits.
• A workflow to increase patient safety is allowing for real-time access to providers and clinical staff regarding treatment questions or concerns via secure online messaging. This includes optimizing office workflows to allow for two dedicated staff members to align with this program.
• To increase patient safety, we are utilizing the patient portal to empower patients to take ownership and accountability for their treatment with 24/7 portal access. We are also sending weekly education and tips regarding their weight loss journey.

Lona Kolman is a Clinical Systems Analyst at Wooster Community Hospital in Wooster, Ohio. She has over 15 years of experience in Information Systems and 21 years’ experience in the healthcare industry. As a Clinical Systems Analyst, her primary focus is on the Ambulatory Provider Office side of MEDITECH. Lona holds a Master of Science in Health Informatics (Knowledge Management), a Bachelors in Science in Health Care Administration, and an Associates of Science in Medical Assisting. Lona is a Certified Healthcare Technology Specialist (TR) with AHIMA. Outside of her career, Lona loves spending time with her two children and enjoying the outdoors.

Lane Helman is a Provider Liaison for Wooster Community Hospital in Wooster, Ohio. She specializes in providing MEDITECH and IT support to 17 ambulatory offices. Lane has been a part of the medical field since graduating in 2015 with a degree in Health Care Office Management. She has been a part of the IT field for five months and is excited to continue to grow within this field and learn more. When Lane is not working, she enjoys being with her family and friends, and traveling with her husband.

109 – Referral Management Nightmares?

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Christopher Dallaire
Organization: Permian Regional Medical Center – Andrews Family Medicine, Andrews, Texas

Does managing the volume of workload messages and paper binders filled with referral information keep you up at night? Not us, anymore. Are you struggling with where in the process a referral order is? With implementation of the Authorization and Referral Management dashboard, we were able to streamline our efforts to efficiently track the entire life cycle of the referral order. Whether you have a team of referral nurses, or just manage a single provider practice, this is the session you don’t want to miss!

Learning objectives:

• Learn how we built the Authorization and Referral Management Dashboard (ARM and AMB setup).
• Learn how we customized access to be able to manage a large practice for our referral nurses to manage their workload.
• Gain improved communication between referral staff and ordering providers as to the status of their referrals.

Christopher Dallaire, Clinic Director, has been in healthcare for 30+ years. He started as a floor nurse, and we went from paper to an electronic health record in 2000 (MEDITECH Magic). Christopher moved into healthcare IT in 2014 as a clinical analyst, supporting ambulatory clinics (MEDITECH CS). He then went into consulting in 2017, assisting in implementing ambulatory at several sites in the Midwest (Web Ambulatory / Expanse). Currently, Christopher is fortunate enough to be a director of a large rural health clinic in West Texas (since 2020) and keeps his hands in everything ambulatory as much as he can.

111 – Enhancing Patient Care and Safety Using Clinical Surveillance in MEDITECH 2.2

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Joohyun Greenwood and Tara Madigan
Organization: Wooster Community Hospital Health System, Wooster, Ohio

Surveillance plays a significant role in promptly identifying high-risk patients and implementing timely interventions for optimal patient care. This presentation will highlight the application of Surveillance 2.2 in nursing and pharmacy and provide insights for building surveillance in MEDITECH 2.2 environment.

Learning objectives:

• Attendees will discover the key benefits of Surveillance in the 2.2 environment.
• Attendees will understand how to incorporate Surveillance awareness into end user workflows.
• Attendees will consider critical decision points surrounding Surveillance usage.

Joohyun Greenwood, PharmD, MS, Senior Clinical Info Analyst, has been a pharmacist over 11 year and is skilled in in pharmacy informatics and data analytics. She has been involved in numerous healthcare informatics projects focusing on improving patient care and outcomes.

Tara Madigan, BSN RN has been a nurse for 15 years and a clinical systems analyst for the past five years. She enjoys improving the EMR experience, so clinicians are positioned to focus on patient care. She also values creating electronic processes to advance positive patient outcomes.

112 – Integrating Expanse BCA with ACO Payer Data

Track: Population Health & Analytics
Presenter: Tina O'Hanlon
Organization: St Mary's Healthcare, Amsterdam, New York

Tapping into BCA's potential, this presentation shows how to link external data files with BCA custom and standard datasets. Using files from our ACO, we created BCA dashboards that show:

• The number of ACO members attributed to providers that are not on staff.
• Review of the annual practice membership and new practice patients by provider, location, and zip code.
• A comparison of payer chronic conditions with patient problems.
• How to use BCA and suspected problems in Expanse to monitor and document chronic problems reported by payers.
• How to use BCA and CCM registry to monitor patients flagged by the ACO as needing CM review.

Learning objectives:

• How to import external files and link with data in Expanse.
• How to verify attributed patients/practices using BCA.
• How to manage chronic condition lists from payers.

Tina O'Hanlon, Manager, Informatics and Analytics, has 20+ years of progressive IT experience, from Analyst to CIO. She has worked with Magic, C/S & Expanse, independent and matrixed environments and is an expert with NPR. Tina current focus is analytics and informatics.

113 – Improve Insurance Verification and Copay Collection Using BCA

Track: Population Health & Analytics
Presenter: Tina O'Hanlon
Organization: St Mary's Healthcare, Amsterdam, New York

The data in BCA is expansive and overwhelming. This presentation reviews the process and end result of a collaboration of finance, ambulatory, and IT to create a daily dashboard for leaders. We started with the stated goal of reducing denials. Through the process we developed a metric that leaders can quickly monitor on a daily basis. The number of primary insurances verified in our clinics increased from 487 to 6,327, and copay collection is 90%. We are rolling it out to the Emergency room and other locations now. ER insurance verification was not being done and is currently at 87%. ER Copay collection is at 25%.

Learning objectives:

• How to use BCA to increase insurance verification and copay collection at the time of visit.
• How to collaborate with SMEs to start with a goal and find a single metric that is actionable on a daily basis; and then create BCA dashboards.   
• MicroStrategy, the tool BCA uses, has the ability to embed Dossiers into SharePoint and Teams. We are working with MEDITECH to embed BCA dashboards into our local Intranet that uses SharePoint.

Tina O'Hanlon, Manager, Informatics and Analytics, has 20+ years of progressive IT experience, from Analyst to CIO. She has worked with Magic, C/S & Expanse, independent and matrixed environments and is an expert with NPR. Tina current focus is analytics and informatics.

114 – Managing Legacy and Acquired Data – A Community Hospital’s Approach

Track: Interoperability / Integration
Presenter: Tina Whims
Organization: Frederick Health, Frederick, Maryland

Over the past few years, Frederick Health's niche vendor applications have been replaced by MEDITECH Expanse functionality creating a large amount of legacy data. Concurrently, we have acquired several physician practices and associated EHR application data. We will share our approach to managing disparate data sets to support patient care and release of information workflows.

Learning objectives:

• Learn about options for managing disparate legacy and acquired data sets.
• Hear about the steps and timeline Frederick Health followed for selecting an archive vendor partner.
• Learn about the implementation of an archive data management system including the timeline, benefits, and lessons learned.

Tina Whims, Senior Applications Analyst, is a seasoned healthcare IT professional with extensive experience implementing, managing, and supporting ambulatory information systems. She is particularly interested in projects to improve access to clinical information for patients in our care.

115 – Drive Efficiency with MEDITECH Interoperability

Track: Interoperability / Integration
Presenter: Sherry Montileone
Organization: Citizens Memorial Hospital, Bolivar, Missouri

Join me in a review of MEDITECH interfaces and how to use them to drive efficiency. We will focus on what interfaces are available and when and how to use them, demystifying Hl7, FHIR, Smart on FHIR, Contextual launches, Traverse and more. We will also cover some best practices on how to inventory interfaces and protect patient data by sending minimum necessary and using the patient consent query.

Learning objectives:

• Know how to determine what interfaces exist and how to use them.
• Understand the new interoperability terms and use cases – FHIR, Smart On FHIR, Traverse, etc.
• Respect patient rights by using the Patient Consent query to "opt out" of data sharing.

Sherry Montileone, CIO, has over 40 years of IT experience with 13 years at a Cerner shop and the last 23 years at CMH using MEDITECH. She grew up in the CMH service area and is passionate about providing patients a safe, efficient, and modern EMR. CMH is an integrated healthcare system in rural Missouri including a hospital, surgical center, rural health and specialty clinics, LTC facilities, and Home Health Hospice. CMH also hosts Expanse for a Critical Access Hospital and three FQHCs in the service area. Go CMH!

116 – Patient Own Insulin Pump: Their Pump, Our Practice

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Shreya Bodar    
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

The use of Patient Own Medication (POM) is still a necessary practice, particularly if the patient is attached to a machine like an insulin pump. The ability to better comprehend how Patients Own Medication (POM) insulin pump dummy drug is built within MEDITECH, as well as the admin criteria screens, provides us with a greater understanding of what impact this has on the clinical workflow. Come learn how MEDITECH's technical capabilities can be combined with people processes in order to optimize patient care for patients undergoing inpatient insulin pump therapy.

Learning objectives:

• Review Patient Own Medication (POM) insulin pump build and Admin Criteria in MEDITECH.
• Show a detailed outline of Admin Criteria screens and the intent behind the clinical decision screens.
• Understand the impact of POM insulin pump in clinical workflow and policies.

Shreya Bodar, Pharm.D., Director of Clinical Pharmacy Informatics for HCA Healthcare in Nashville, Tennessee. Dr. Bodar provides leadership for enterprise-wide adoption for multiple EHR projects including Promoting Interoperability, MEDITECH Change Control/Release adoption, Pyxis support, MEDITECH Service release updates, and CPOE. She leads numerous projects in the medication management informatics space across the enterprise. Dr. Bodar received her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Nova Southeastern University in Davie, Florida. Prior to joining the HCA Corporate Clinical Operations Group in a Clinical Pharmacy Informatics role, she held multiple positions in HCA, including Division Pharmacy Informatics to Division ITG pharmacy manager expanding to include advance clinical team supporting MEDITECH and PatientKeeper sites.

117 – Novel Uses of Surveillance: Creating Focus and Efficiency in the Noise of Routine Healthcare

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Stefanie Fine, Kayla Johnson, and Tara Haines
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

Do these requests sound familiar?
“It is a regulatory requirement so can you require a response in the EHR?” 
“We need a new report for compliance and auditing.”
“It takes me hours to find the information for my record review … can you make it easier?”

How often do you ask yourself these questions?
“How can we support our teams to work smarter, not harder?”
“How can we support our service line excellence efforts with resource constraints?”
“How can we best support the growing novice workforce in learning how to be compliant with their documentation?”

One industry where technology has not greatly contributed to efficiency is healthcare. Think of cashing a check, shopping for furniture, or even airline travel. Then think about clinical documentation and record reviews.

There is a growing demand for regulatory-required documentation and data collection has driven some organizations to add “required” hard stops. This results in non-value responses (e.g. “not assessed”) and creates a fragmented clinical documentation workflow, lack of predictive analysis, and an overall burdensome documentation experience for our clinicians – especially our novice clinicians.   

The output is often just as fragmented and creates inefficiencies for our team members that must monitor and drive compliance (often retrospectively), and for those that review/audit records throughout the continuum of care. Our solutions assist in finding the ‘needle in the haystack’ – saving time and frustration in the constant process of documentation.

Join us as we walk through our journey of using Surveillance to address these challenges and drive efficiencies along the care continuum – from clinician facing to the record review.

Learning objectives:

• Understand the need for alternative solutions for “hard stops” in the Electronic Health Record.
• Discuss the innovative approach leveraging Surveillance to provide visibility, drive compliance, prevent fragmented documentation workflow and to gain efficiencies.
• Identify and discuss how to scale the breadth and depth of standardized Surveillance solutions for diverse service lines across an enterprise.

Stefanie Fine, MHA, RN, LNC, PCCN-K, joined HCA in 1997 and serves as the Sr. Director of Nursing and Clinical Documentation Standards. She is responsible for the standardized clinical documentation for several clinical domains and Expanse Surveillance solutions across the enterprise. Key responsibilities of this role include standardization of clinical documentation and data, reduction in nursing documentation burden, and adherence to current evidence and regulatory requirements.

Over her 26 years with HCA, she has served as a cardiac and critical care nurse, and progressed to varying and progressive clinical, quality, and operational leadership roles. She transitioned to the corporate team in 2017 to lead nursing documentation standardization across the enterprise. While serving at HCA Healthcare, Stefanie additionally managed an Internal Medicine Practice and as a Legal Nurse Consultant. She holds a Bachelor's of Science in Nursing degree from Georgia Baptist College of Nursing (now Mercer University) and a Master's of Healthcare Administrations with a focus in Healthcare Informatics.

Kayla Johnson, MSN, RN, is a consulting clinical analyst on HCA’s MEDITECH Expanse build team. She serves as the enterprise lead for the Expanse Surveillance product and its clinical decision support capabilities. Her key responsibilities include spearheading the Surveillance build team efforts for the organization, driving fundamental components of the product’s planning, vetting, prioritization, build, and optimization.
 
Kayla is in her fourteenth year with HCA. She received her BSN from Middle Tennessee State University in 2010 and then began her career in healthcare as an inpatient medical/surgical and oncology nurse. After several years at the bedside, she earned her MSN in Nursing Informatics from Walden University and transitioned to informatics-focused roles. During this time, she supported physicians, nurses, and other clinicians in large rollouts for computerized provider order entry, evidence-based clinical documentation, Mobile Heartbeat, Expanse, and more before joining the corporate Expanse team in early 2023. Kayla is incredibly passionate about the role of technology in healthcare and the immense impact that clinical decision support can have on patients and clinicians.

Tara Haines, MSN, MBA, MNI, RN, PMP, is the Clinical Services Group AVP of Nursing Informatics and Engagement for Expanse. She is the enterprise Expanse Nursing Champion, responsible for developing and delivering on nursing informatics and EHR implementation, as well as change management strategies to support HCA’s mission, vision, and goals by creating an optimized EHR experience and change management model for our next generation EHR platform.

Haines joined HCA in 1997 as a critical care nurse and was one of the original super users for the move from paper to MEDITECH Magic. Over the years, Haines has held many roles moving from Charge Nurse, Nursing Supervisor, Critical Care Director and Director of Advanced Clinicals before moving to division roles. She worked for ITG for several years as division EHR manager and Director of Application Services before rejoining the clinical team as the VP Nursing Informatics for North Florida Division. Over the last 26 years Haines has helped implement CPOE and PatientKeeper Advanced Clinicals. Through her career Tara as demonstrated a strong focus on innovation, project implementations and elevating practice outcomes. She holds three Master’s Degrees: Nursing, Business Administration, and Health Informatics. She is a certified Project Management Professional through the Project Management Institute.

118 – Integrating 270/271 Eligibility Checking

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Erika Milosevic
Organization: Wooster Community Hospital Health System, Wooster, Ohio

This presentation outlines our processes and experiences of integrating MEDITECH's 270/271 interface with another vendor. Concepts addressed include pre-LIVE preparation including with the other vendor, interface and network teams, MEDITECH, department directors, and end-users. We will talk about some of our results and resources utilized during this process. Also discussed, build specifications, obstacles, optimization, and limitations encountered during the process of integration. Last, we will talk about some troubleshooting tips, things we wish we knew beforehand and considerations before integrating 270/271.

Learning objectives:

• Have a clear understanding of the resources necessary and utilized during the integration process.
• Define three obstacles or challenges to look out for and how you might solve them.
• Understand the importance of mapping both users and payers with the other vendor.

Erika Milosevic, AAB, is a Systems Analyst at Wooster Community Hospital. After returning to the workforce approximately 10 years ago, she has worked in many roles in healthcare including administrative, office manager, registration, and currently as an analyst. While working in registration in a busy ER in a large city, Erika worked closely with the IT department. While troubleshooting and resolving issues with IT, she discovered she enjoyed it. She went back to school during the height of COVID and finished her degree in Computer Technology two years later.

119 – Envisioning A 'Picture Perfect' Expanse Implementation And Then Delivering It!

Track: Expanse
Presenter: John Wilcox
Organization: Morris Hospital & Healthcare Centers, Morris, Illinois; Tegria

Undertaking, planning for, and executing on a major systems consolidation project is a multi-year and multi-million dollar commitment of resources. The journey is a winding road through system selection, contract negotiation, READY partner identification, budget preparation, project planning, system build, configuration, testing, training, and Go Live. It is fraught with many challenges and risks along the way which if not mitigated, can lead to an outcome that can be very disruptive to a healthcare organization's operations and its overall financial stability.  

This session will provide attendees with a high-level overview of Morris Hospital & Healthcare Center's (MHHC) seven-year trek towards a 'big bang' Go Live. Executives from MHHC's Program Management Office will offer their insights as to the key principles and best practices that led to a very successful consolidation of four disparate EHRs into a single Expanse configuration. The project was delivered on time, under budget, and in a way that allowed the organization to quickly return to normal operations with minimal disruptions.  

Overall, this session is essential for healthcare professionals who are considering a MEDITECH Expanse implementation in the near future or who are interested in learning more about best practices in this area. Attendees will leave the session with a solid understanding of the key principles and practices involved in successfully implementing MEDITECH Expanse, and they will be well-prepared to apply these principles and practices to their own healthcare organizations.

Learning objectives:

• Gain insights into important aspects of pre-implementation decision making including having the right vision, selecting the right platform, identifying the right implementation partner, and establishing the right project budget.
• Understand the importance of effective resource planning and project management in the successful implementation of MEDITECH Expanse.
• Learn seven key ingredients for success that can be considered for incorporation into attendees' project plans.

John Wilcox, Vice President / CIO, joined Morris Hospital & Healthcare Centers in June of 2017. Since 2007, Mr. Wilcox has served in similar healthcare CIO roles with The Menninger Clinic, United Medical Center, and Ozarks Medical Center. He has previous senior IT executive experience having held business unit CIO positions within General Motors and Continental Airlines. Mr. Wilcox holds a Computer Engineering degree from Case Western Reserve University and an M.B.A. from the University of Michigan - Flint.

Vicki Schuurhuis is a Project Executive with Tegria.

120 – Expansive Preparation for Go Live – A Change in Change Management – The Pharmacy Journey

Track: Expanse
Presenter: William Storey Cooper
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

As a follow up to the 2023 MUSE IEE Winning presentation “Expansive Preparation for Go Live – A Colorful MEDITECH Expanse Pharmacy Journey”, this presentation will detail how a large multi-hospital system has developed a grass roots change management philosophy and system to facilitate the conversion and maintenance of 180+ hospitals from MEDITECH Magic to the Expanse Cloud-based system. This change management system allows us to steer through trouble waters to collaboration with subject matter experts at the facility, division, and corporate level to achieve the treasured goal of a sustainable change management process. HCA’s alpha and beta pilot sites are now live on Expanse Cloud and are in the calm before the storm before actual implementation waves begin. Our holistic approach to enterprise-wide pharmacy change management will allow us to move forward in a successful and methodical manner.

Learning objectives:

• Understand a transitional journey from MEDITECH Magic to Expanse Cloud for a large multi-hospital healthcare system.
• Contrast past and current change management processes used for MEDITECH and Expanse Cloud.
• Discuss what the future of HCA’s Expanse Cloud change management.

Dr. William Storey Cooper, Pharm.D.; CPHIMS received his Bachelor of Science degree in Biochemistry from Lee University and his Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Union University School of Pharmacy. He completed his post-graduate Year 1 Pharmacy residency at North Mississippi Medical Center and went on to complete a post-graduate Year 2 Pharmacy Informatics residency at the HCA Healthcare corporate offices through the University of Tennessee. Dr. Cooper then joined the HCA Clinical Services Group’s Pharmacy Informatics Team and now serves as a Manager, Clinical Pharmacy Informatics. His primary and most enjoyed areas of work are related to Clinical Decisions Support tools, enterprise change management, Residency Selection Committee Chair activities, pharmacy research, and enhancing healthcare for better patient outcomes.

121 – Web Oncology – Managing Patient Treatments with MEDITECH

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Sarah Smith
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

MEDITECH Oncology has an extensive NCCN-backed treatment plan library included in standard content. Initial build strategy and especially maintenance can be a heavy lift for many teams. Join this session to learn more about the Oncology treatment plan build, tips, and tricks for speeding up the process, and hear lessons learned from my experiences implementing Web Oncology.

Learning objectives:

• Integration of treatment and clinic appointments and functionality.
• Who in the facility needs to be included in oncology planning and build discussions.
• Lessons learned from two very different implementations of oncology – one with outpatient clinic with providers and one inpatient location with no providers.

Sarah Smith, Manager, Oncology EMR, has a clinical background starting out in retail and specialty pharmacies and was a consultant for 13 years before transitioning to manage the Medical Oncology EMR and implementation space for HCA Healthcare. Her MEDITECH application specialties include Oncology, MIS, and Universe (in relation to the Person/User build), CMS/DMD, and Patient Portal. She also has experience in CWS, REG, AMB Front Office and Clinical, PCS, PHA, and LAB thanks to the integrations and collaborations needed within the Oncology implementation process.

122 – A Jab at a Moving Target: Conforming to Vaccine Updates within an EHR

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Huner Aradini
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

Vaccines product and recommendations are constantly fluid. This was especially evident in recent years with introduction of various vaccines, at a rapid pace, during the pandemic. The fluidity of these changes can highlight the need to assist clinicians in promoting appropriate vaccinations within the EHR. With changes to recommendations in pneumococcal vaccination from the CDC, there was a need to overhaul the current layout of vaccine promotion within the current EHR but also evaluating future state with an ongoing initiative to convert to Expanse.

Learning objectives:

• Understand the need for updates to vaccination processes within an EHR.
• Identify the various complexities in streamlining vaccination recommendations.
• Detail potential directions in order to promote appropriate vaccinations.

Huner Aradini graduated from Lipscomb College of Pharmacy with a Doctor of Pharmacy degree and also completed his Master of Science in Healthcare Informatics while pursuing his pharmacy degree at Lipscomb University. Dr. Aradini began his practicing career focused on pharmacy informatics and operations within a hospital setting. Dr. Aradini then transitioned to a role helping support multiple heath systems and hospitals within a single EHR system. He is now a Clinical Pharmacy Informatics Manager, within the Clinical Pharmacy Informatics team, at HCA Healthcare in Nashville, TN. His passions in the field of pharmacy informatics are closely tied to improving operations and workflow to help better support patient care. This includes enhancements within an EHR, product support, application of data, and other supportive measures.    

123 – Improving Patient Safety through Patient Scanning of Remote Telemetry Monitoring

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Jason A. Johnson
Organization: Willis-Knighton Health System, Shreveport, Louisiana

A patient safety concern was identified when the incorrect patient had a remote telemetry monitoring box attached to them that was marked incorrectly on the remote telemetry monitoring station. The telemetry monitoring station showed that the patient was in Atrial Fibrillation with Rapid Ventricular Response. The nurse notified the provider via phone and received verbal orders for treatment. They initiated therapy for this patient. It was then discovered that the remote telemetry box did not match the patient. The Afib patient was in a different room on the same floor. As part of our Root Cause Analysis and utilizing Just Culture to determine what systems contributed to this risk, we determined that we could solve this with an IT solution. We developed a nursing workflow and documentation to enable scanning of the remote telemetry box at the time of placement on the patient.

Learning objectives:

• Identify patient safety concerns with remote telemetry monitoring.
• Describe scanning solutions through documentation to increase patient safety for remote telemetry monitoring.
• Define workflows within learner's organization that can be improved by utilizing scanning technology within clinical documentation to ensure right patient, right equipment.

Jason Johnson, Clinical Nursing Informatics, is a Registered Nurse at Willis Knighton Health System in Shreveport, LA. Jason has been an emergency room nurse for Willis Knighton since 2016 and joined the IT department in 2021. Jason is a Certified Emergency Nurse and Certified Pediatric Emergency Nurse, an instructor for the Trauma Nurse Core Curriculum, and serves on several committees for the Louisiana Emergency Nurse's Association. Jason's nursing passion is in education, both for his patients, and in precepting new hire nurses into emergency nursing. In his spare time, Jason is an avid board game enthusiast and movie watcher. He loves to travel, especially if there is a water involved.

124 – Wait, Who's Documenting?  Code Blue Documentation, Simplified

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Jason Johnson
Organization: Willis-Knighton Health System, Shreveport, Louisiana

Accurate documentation of real time events is a complicated task. Many nurses rely on white boards, sticky notes, and flowsheets to document information and then spend time back charting information into the EHR. In high stress events, such as code blue documentation, leveraging computerized technology to inform clinical decision making, provide real time access to results, and accurate real time documentation enhances clinician workflow and improves accuracy of charting. Model build for Code Blue documentation in MEDITECH Expanse is not ideal. Developing a code blue documentation build that was clean, user friendly, and accurate was of paramount importance to our health system.  After completing this course, end users can take back lessons learned when adapting code blue documentation into the EHR.

Learning objectives:

• Define Code Blue documentation for the organization and best practices for documenting critical interventions.
• Identify methods for accurately capturing documentation and generating required code blue reporting information.
• Describe ways to track compliance with accurate documentation.

Jason Johnson, Clinical Nursing Informatics, is a Registered Nurse at Willis Knighton Health System in Shreveport, LA. Jason has been an emergency room nurse for Willis Knighton since 2016 and joined the IT department in 2021. Jason is a Certified Emergency Nurse and Certified Pediatric Emergency Nurse, an instructor for the Trauma Nurse Core Curriculum, and serves on several committees for the Louisiana Emergency Nurse's Association. Jason's nursing passion is in education, both for his patients, and in precepting new hire nurses into emergency nursing. In his spare time, Jason is an avid board game enthusiast and movie watcher. He loves to travel, especially if there is a water involved.

125 – Increasing Patient Access with the Patient Portal

Track: Patient Engagement
Presenter: Whitney Spiegel
Organization: Citizens Memorial Hospital, Bolivar, Missouri

In this presentation, we will review patient engagement using self-service functionality including onboarding, direct booking in clinics and the mammography department, virtual visits, and more.

Learning objectives:

• Develop strategies to engage stakeholders in expanding patient portal functionality.
• Identify and capitalize on benefits of increased patient interactions.
• Configure the portal for patient self-service satisfaction.

Whitney Spiegel has worked at Citizens Memorial Hospital since 2012. She has worked as a systems analyst for seven years supporting Registration, Authorization and Referral Management, Community Wide Scheduling, and the Patient Portal for clinics, the hospital, and long-term care.

126 – Decision Support Pathways

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Stephen Briggs
Organization: Catawba Valley Health System, Hickory, North Carolina

Clinical decision support improves workflow efficiency and increases quality of patient care. Clinical decision pathways within Order Management can help providers navigate complex disease states that have multiple decision points. A pathway approach allows information to be presented only when a decision is being made. Decision pathways require the typical building blocks of order sets but rely heavily on planning and organization. This presentation will review examples of clinical decision pathways and the process to build them.

Learning objectives:

• Describe clinical decision support.
• Identify opportunities for implementing clinical pathways.
• Understand the process for designing and implementing decision support pathways.

Stephen Briggs, Clinical Informatics Pharmacist, completed his BS in Biology at Western Carolina University and Doctor of Pharmacy at Wingate University. He has worked at Catawba Valley Medical Center in Hickory NC for the past 10 years. During his time at CVMC, he has worked as a Staff Pharmacist, Clinical Pharmacist, and Informatics Pharmacist.

127 – Building for the Future – Location, Room Design, and Governance

Track: Business Intelligence, Quality Management and Reporting
Presenter: Jeff Gerrits
Organization: Southlake Regional Health Centre, Newmarket, Ontario

This presentation will give a deep dive into MEDITECH location and room builds, downstream implications, and how this relates to:

The End User Experience
What the end user sees and how easy it is to understand. Any project needs to consider fostering and maintain clarity, and this ranges from patients navigating the hospital to nurses utilizing MEDITECH and planners/leaders having an easy to conceptualize system.

Programmability/Interoperability/Reporting
How your build choices enable and support programmability. Enabling consistent and easy to create reporting data and how this affects downstream systems. Is this data easy to use as is, or does it require complex mappings and lookup tables?

Change Management
How robust is your setup if things change? Can you easily move a unit from one area of the hospital to another with ease? How easy is it to make a change? How do changes impact downstream systems and can you make it easier by design? Exploring the nature of change in the healthcare space, and how it relates to your build in MEDITECH.

Learning objectives:

• How to leverage naming conventions programmatically.
• Ways that we can make everyone's job easier, by taking a proactive and detailed approach to governance and standards surrounding MEDITECH builds.
• Strengthen synergies across business units, by making the system easy to understand, use, and conceptualize.

Jeff Gerrits, IDEAS Application Specialist, started out developing custom applications in MS Access and VB.NET, reporting on activates in these applications with Crystal Reports or home-grown solutions. He quickly became familiar with a wide range of technology. For the first 17 years of his working life, if it had a microchip in it, he was expected to know how the technology worked and how to leverage the technology to meet business needs.

In 2016, Jeff left manufacturing and took a role in the public sector at Southlake Regional Health Centre. He has since worked hard to take on the considerable task of learning a new industry, and hopes to continue to leverage his strong technical and data management skills to improve healthcare technology adoption and value.

128 – Policies – Advantage IT

Track: Support & Technology
Presenter: John Pritchard
Organization: Pella Regional Health Center, Pella, Iowa

Policies can be insightful, clarifying, and supportive of the technology department. WHAT?!?! We were forced to review our information technology policies. We dreaded it ... and then embraced it as we began to encounter challenges where we found the policies could make the case for support of technology.

We will look at examples where policies have come to the aid of the technology department in addition to sharing the overall organization of our policies. We will dive deeper into a recent Artificial Intelligence policy and will open up discussion and diagnosis of other policies.

Learning objectives:

• Learn to embrace policies as a means of supporting the technology department.
• Organize your policies into categories that make sense to the department and the administration.
• Access to an Artificial Intelligence policy.

John Pritchard has been in the technology field for over 40 years serving organizations in the fields of super computers, education, and recently in the health care space. He founded, grew and sold a technology services company that provided infrastructure and security services to companies in the Sioux City, Iowa area over a 25-year period.

129 – BCA: Pathways to Success

Track: Business Intelligence, Quality Management and Reporting
Presenters: Mike Veerman and Robyn Whelchel
Organization: Emanate Health, Covina, California

Business and Clinical Analytics (BCA) serves as an invaluable data analytics tool, providing information in an easily understandable format. However, realizing its potential within your organization presents both opportunities and challenges. Our primary objective today is to enable your entire organization to succeed with BCA, enhancing your ability to discern trends and understand your data.

Drawing upon a diverse range of experiences, particularly within the dynamic environment of Emanate Health, we underscore the essential components necessary for success while navigating common pitfalls. By offering insights into strategies for overcoming challenges during implementation and adoption, with a focus on maximizing BCA's impact, success will be within your reach, especially among non-IT personnel. The session concludes with a demonstration of BCA's transformative capabilities, highlighting its role in facilitating informed decision-making and improving patient outcomes within healthcare organizations.

Learning objectives:

• Identify and understand how to implement the three key components crucial for ensuring success with BCA: user engagement, leadership commitment, and effective resource allocation.
• Identify and address common pitfalls that occur within a BCA Implementation.
• Learn about creating dashboards within BCA, and how datasets are linked to data sources.

Mike Veerman, a Senior Programmer/Analyst at Emanate Health for 6.5 years, brings over 26 years of programming and data analysis expertise to his role. He is instrumental in managing data analytics efforts, focusing on creating Business and Clinical Analytics (BCA) datasets and dashboards, developing SQL reports, and overseeing data extraction and loading. Mike's proficiency in database management and SQL enables him to streamline processes and provide critical insights for decision-making. Alongside his technical responsibilities, Mike conducts training sessions to empower colleagues in dashboard creation, fostering a culture of data literacy. He ensures the smooth operation of BCA through vigilant oversight, continuously optimizing SQL processes and resources for peak performance.

Robyn Whelchel brings over two decades of experience in the healthcare industry, focusing on driving process improvement and delivering data-driven solutions. With a background as a consultant, Robyn has specialized in MEDITECH systems across Home Health, Acute, and Ambulatory settings for over 20 years. Her expertise extends to implementing Business and Clinical Analytics (BCA) methodologies, with a track record of successfully integrating BCA frameworks at numerous client sites over the last six years. Throughout her career, Robyn has been committed to providing insightful reports and innovative data solutions, leveraging her extensive industry knowledge to facilitate informed decision-making and drive operational excellence.

130 – Prescription Fill Data Empowers Nurse Navigators to Close Medication Adherence Gaps

Track: Population Health & Analytics
Presenters: Dr. Ben G. Long and Brooke Brown
Organization: Magnolia Regional Health Center, Corinth, Mississippi

Congestive heart failure (CHF) is a significant burden on patients and health systems nationwide, and is especially burdensome in our northeast Mississippi community. Recent strides in standards of treatment and innovative care methods aim to improve the quality of life of these patients. At Magnolia Regional Health Center, we report significant improvements in reducing prescription gaps in standard medication treatment for CHF and improved medication adherence using digital tools, clinical documentation, and report writing in MEDITECH Expanse, and a robust Nurse Navigator program.

Learning objectives:

• Explain the challenges of managing Congestive Heart Failure patients.
• Understand how to design and implement a successful Nurse Navigator program.
• Demonstrate the results of a Nurse Navigator program on improving prescription gaps and medication adherence.

Ben G. Long, M.D. graduated medical school from The University of Mississippi Medical Center (2016) and had an internship and residency at The Medical University of South Carolina (2019). He is an Associate Clinical Professor of Internal Medicine and Director of Quality and Safety Curriculum. He was awarded the MRHC Quality Physician Award (2022) and Safety Award (2023).

Brooke Brown, R.N. is the Nurse Navigator at Magnolia Regional Health Center.

131 – Allied Health Disciplines in PDOC

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Blythe Dalziel
Organization: Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, Toronto, Canada

With the launch from Client Server to Expanse 2.1, Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital transitioned the majority of Allied Health documentation from PCS to PDOC in both Web Acute (inpatient) and Web Ambulatory (outpatient). The decision to move Allied Health to PDOC offers advantages for shared documentation between providers, expanded use of custom widgets, increased access to health information for patients/families through the Portal, increased information sharing between hospital providers through Connecting Ontario, in addition to the use of other features streamlining documentation efficiency. Attend this presentation to learn more about our Allied Health PDOC experience.

Learning objectives:

• Increased knowledge of advantages and key considerations when building allied health documentation in PDOC.
• Gain an understanding of build design and supported clinical workflows to improve documentation efficiency within and between health disciplines.
• Lessons learned from implementation will be shared so that attendees can apply the key points to their organization

Blythe Dalziel, Clinical Application Speciation on the Information Management & Technology team at Holland Bloorview has a clinical background as a physiotherapist with over 15 years of experience in healthcare. In the role of Clinical Application Specialist, Blythe has been involved in various Expanse builds across web ambulatory, web acute and PCS platforms. She has participated in project implementation related to integrating health care systems including Connecting Ontario, and Point-to-Point integration, and Traverse Exchange Canada (TEC).

132 – Navigating Change: Leadership Strategies for Cultivating a Culture of Training and Elbow Support in EHR Implementation

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Mark Galea
Organization: Willis-Knighton Health System, Shreveport, Louisiana

Implementing an electronic health record (EHR) system in a healthcare organization requires more than just technical expertise. It demands effective change leadership strategies to cultivate a culture of training and elbow support, ensuring successful EHR implementation. This presentation explores the importance of change leadership and provides strategies for fostering a supportive culture during the EHR implementation process. 

The presentation begins by emphasizing the challenges faced by healthcare organizations during EHR implementation, including resistance to change, lack of training, and inadequate support for end-users. It then highlights the critical role of change leadership in driving successful adoption and acceptance of the new system. 

Attendees will gain insights into change leadership strategies that have proven successful in fostering a culture of training and elbow support during EHR implementation. Real-world examples of organizations that have effectively leveraged these strategies will be showcased, highlighting the positive impact on user adoption, workflow efficiency, and patient care. 

In conclusion, this presentation highlights the crucial role of change leadership in cultivating a culture of training and elbow support during EHR implementation. By implementing effective change strategies, healthcare organizations can overcome resistance, promote user engagement, and ensure a smooth transition to the new system. Attendees will leave with practical knowledge and actionable strategies to lead change and create a culture of training and support in their own organizations.

Learning objectives:

• Gain insights into change leadership strategies that have proven successful in fostering a culture of training and elbow support.
• Insight on real-world examples of organizations that have effectively leveraged these strategies will be showcased, highlighting the positive impact on user adoption, workflow efficiency, and patient care.
• Gain practical knowledge and actionable strategies to lead change and create a culture of training and support in their own organizations.

Mark Galea is the Senior Vice President/CIO at Willis-Knighton Health Systems.

133 – Get Me to the O.R.! A Comprehensive Approach to Order Management and Provider Documentation to Facilitate Surgical Workflow and Promote Best Practices

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Dr. Douglas A. Janowski and Tammy Goldsmith
Organization: Willis-Knighton Health System, Shreveport, Louisiana

The requirements, both organizational and regulatory (CMS and TJC) for bringing patients to the O.R. create a complex pathway of documentation and orders for physicians, nurses, pharmacy, lab, radiology, and administration. A comprehensive approach to leveraging Expanse to optimize that workflow establishes efficiency and effectiveness for these teams and promotes the highest levels of safety and best practices in the care of our patients.

Douglas Janowski, M.D. is the Senior Physician Advisor for Information Technology and Clinical Integrated Network at Willis-Knighton Health System in Shreveport, Louisiana. A Gastroenterologist since 2003, Dr. Janowski has worked as a physician executive with a focus on Informatics, Quality Metrics and Measures and Clinical Operational optimization. Recognizing the combined complexities and challenges of the convergence of health care and information technology, Dr. Janowski focuses on optimizing the clinical I.T. infrastructure for providers and patients that promotes best practices, efficiencies, access, and equity within a quality-based model. In his spare time, Dr. Janowski enjoys the beach, travel, and coaching ice hockey.

Tammy Goldsmith is the VP of Health IT Consultant with The Shams Group. Tammy has a degree in Business from Columbia College with over 20 years of healthcare experience with ten plus years with MEDITECH including MAGIC, Client Services and Expanse Financial and Clinical application and more than five decades of Siemens Soarian Clinicals Experience.

135 – Save Your Clinic and Surgical Staff Time: Digital Scheduling via Expanse Ambulatory

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Brooke O'Brien
Organization: CereCore

Ready to reduce the time clinic front office staff and surgical schedulers are on the phone? What if staff never had to fax surgical booking sheets again? Imagine how communication could improve with real-time surgical scheduling in Expanse Ambulatory.  

See how the digital integration between Expanse Ambulatory and Surgical applications transforms workflow and enables more accurate, effective communication between clinics and surgical scheduling.

Learning objectives:

• Demos of the new Ambulatory feature that enhance the surgical booking communication process from your clinic's front office staff to schedulers in surgery.
• Benefits to standardizing surgical communication processes.
• Setup requirements for an optimized build.

Brooke O'Brien has been working within the MEDITECH space for the last 10 years. With a college background working in labs, Brooke pivoted to healthcare IT when she started her career at MEDITECH as an Implementation Specialist. There she spent 7.5 years implementing MEDITECH best practices so that hospitals built their system and developed their workflows to reach the highest HIMSS stages.

Throughout her time at MEDITECH, she was involved in over 50 different implementation projects. These projects spanned all over the world including, the US, Canada, UK, and Australia. For the past year and half, Brooke has been working at CereCore as an Advanced Clinicals Consultant on the MEDITECH professional services team, assisting hospitals that are implementing Expanse or optimizing their existing Expanse environment. Her primary focus is saving her customers time and ultimately money while maintaining the highest and safest level of patient care possible.

136 – Relieve the Pain of Provider Billing with Expanse Dictionary and Documentation Optimizations

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Dawn Osborn
Organization: CereCore

Do you have revenue leaks in your provider billing? Provider documentation drives the coding and billing process so turn it into a billing solution, not a leak, with smart supporting dictionary build techniques. If you are using Expanse Web Ambulatory and Web Acute templates to document care and generate billing, then this interactive session is for you.

Learning objectives:

• Discuss how to support and streamline provider billing through dictionary setup.
• Learn how to add modifier options and troubleshoot common provider documentation issues such as no obvious code or provider coding input needed with query driven charges.
• See an Expanse demo and build techniques that can be used to streamline provider billing.

Dawn Osborn has more than 30 years of healthcare informatics experience, with the last 17 years dedicated solely to MEDITECH Revenue Cycle applications. She works at CereCore in the MEDITECH Professional Services Group as a Senior Consultant doing implementation, post-live optimization, assessment, and project work. Prior to consulting, she worked in the healthcare setting in key revenue cycle-related management and database admin roles. Dawn has a Master Degree in Healthcare Information Administration from the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) and a Bachelor Degree in Clinical Laboratory Sciences, also from MUSC.

137 – Fundamentals of Organizational IT Strategic Alignment

Track: Leadership & Culture
Presenters: Anne Marie Herrera and Madelaine Yue
Organization: Experis Health Solutions

With the historic level of economic uncertainty and its impact on the healthcare industry, organizations are looking for improved return on investment and financial accountability in their IT spend on application assets, balancing the cost-benefit by evaluating business value against drive for operational efficiencies and strategic alignment.

Many CIO’s find themselves in a fire fighting mode, frequently responding to organization needs in a very reactionary way as well as trying to address regulatory requirements and compliance deadlines. Often, operational and IT competing initiatives are not being set up for success resulting in missed expectations and displaced leadership.

This educational session will highlight the need for key executives to engage, collaborate, develop, and commit to a decision-making model that aligns organizational goals, business value and effective technology solutions. By establishing a structured and governed decision-making model, it brings a sense of “reasonableness” and shared accountability to the equation, and insights on being more pro-active to effectively budget and execute for success.

Learning objectives:

• Engaged leadership and governance is the heart of effective organizational IT Strategic Alignment.
• Application Portfolio Rationalization is an important component to IT Strategic Alignment.
• Insights on the fundamental components and their interdependencies to be aligned and execute for success.

Anne Marie Herrera, VP Vendor Solutions – Experis Health Solutions has been an IT health care professional for over 30 years with 12+ years as a senior health care consulting leader and 20 years as a senior IT leader for two very prominent and large California-based health systems. She has provided these organizations expertise and delivery in the areas of IT Strategy, Governance, PMO, IT Quality Performance Management, IT Facility Management, IT Customer Help Desk, and IT Outsourcing/Insourcing. She was the SJHS Enterprise Program Leader for the health system wide MEDITECH EHR implementations. She also initiated an IT Lean program at one health system and re-engineered IT prioritization investments at both health systems.

In her current role, she is a Solution Senior Leader and focuses primarily within the MEDITECH EHR market and works closely with customers, MEDITECH and third-party vendors. Her main responsibility is to provide program oversight, develop “value added” innovative solutions for customers and bring forward the market strategy, methodology and tools for customer delivery. She has worked with prominent organizations in supporting their efforts in aligning organizational vision/goals with IT investments and priorities.

Madelaine Yue, VP Solutions Delivery – Experis Health Solutions has more than 25 years of experience in the healthcare industry, including 20 years of advisory services, systems implementation, and optimization; as well as six years working for a large integrated healthcare delivery system developing strategic metrics and implementing workflow and operational redesigns. She leads Experis Health Solutions’ service practice which includes IT strategy, vendor advisory, Total Cost of Ownership, application and project portfolio rationalization and program development. She is an expert in workflow and systems gap analysis, project management, issue management, strategic management consulting, cross application integration, and full-cycle healthcare systems implementation.

139 – Global Days Deep Dive: Expanse Ambulatory's Workflows

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Marie Kihm
Organization: CereCore

Are you manually tracking patient follow up from a CPT procedure for your AMB clinics or providers? 
Want a better understanding of Expanse Ambulatory workflows related to Global Days? 

Let’s dive into what Global Days are, how they are tracked, and the optimal workflow in Expanse Ambulatory, Community Wide Scheduling, and Revenue Cycle modules. We will peel back the layers of how your Expanse build and setup can affect providers, nurses, schedulers, referral coordinators, registration, billers, and coders.  

At the end of this session, you’ll know more about:

• Global Days payments and surgical procedures
• Basics about CMS Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA)
• Data collection required by CMS to assess the accuracy of global surgical package valuation
• Demo of the Global Charge Expanse screen to clinic staff
• Advantages and ROI of Expanse Ambulatory Global Days setup

Learning objectives:

• Gain better understanding of Global Days payments and surgical procedures and the advantages and ROI of Expanse Ambulatory Global Days setup.
• Discuss the basics about CMS Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) and the data collection required by CMS to assess the accuracy of global surgical package valuation.
• See how the Expanse Ambulatory, Scheduling, and Billing CPT and RVU components work together, and get a demo of the Global Charge Expanse screen to clinic staff.

Marie Kihm, RN MBA, is a Consulting IT Architect with CereCore’s MEDITECH Professional Services Group. Marie brings more than 24 years of healthcare IT experience, having managed many successful MEDITECH implementations and optimizations.

140 – Building Patient Engagement with Human-Centered Design

Track: Patient Engagement
Presenter: Dr. Craig Joseph
Organization: Healthtech - A Nordic Company

This presentation underscores the pivotal role of human-centered design (HCD) in improving patient engagement within healthcare. It highlights the disconnect between current patient engagement strategies and actual patient needs, advocating for a design approach grounded in empathy, ideation, and iteration. Using real-world examples, including a case study of a patient's struggle with a non-intuitive patient portal, the presentation demonstrates the transformative potential of HCD in making healthcare technologies more accessible and empowering for patients. It offers actionable insights for healthcare organizations on adopting HCD principles, emphasizing the necessity of leadership support, interdisciplinary collaboration, and ongoing refinement of patient engagement tools. This talk aims to catalyze a shift towards more empathetic and effective patient-centric healthcare solutions.

Learning objectives:

• Identify key challenges in current patient engagement strategies and analyze how the absence of human-centered design contributes to these issues.
• Define the factors necessary to implement human-centered design principles in the development and refinement of patient engagement technologies.
• Describe how to strategize the integration of human-centered design within their healthcare organizations and advocate for its adoption to key stakeholders.

Craig Joseph, MD serves as the Chief Medical Officer of Nordic Consulting Partners. He is a board-certified pediatrician and clinical informatician. Craig practiced primary care pediatrics for nine years before moving to Madison, WI to work for Epic, an EHR vendor. After seven years there, he served as Chief Medical Information Officer for several hospital systems. At Nordic, Dr. Joseph works with hospitals and healthcare systems to help them improve clinician happiness and efficiency. He’s recently co-authored a book about applying the principles of human-centered design to healthcare.        

141 – Decoding Laboratory and Ambulatory Interoperability

Track: Interoperability/Integration
Presenters: Brandy Barthlama and Ann Marie Roman
Organization: Huron Consulting Group

Reference laboratory interfaces are powerful interoperability tools that allow clinicians to submit orders and receive results from reference laboratories. This presentation examines the implementation and value of physician practices to place and process orders directly to a performing laboratory outside of the MEDITECH Expanse platform.

MEDITECH Expanse has aligned with Quest Diagnostics and LabCorp – the two largest companies in the diagnostic laboratory industry. The efficient integration of the Laboratory Information System (LIS) and Ambulatory (AMB) provides the ability to transmit orders and results as discrete data. 

The presentation starts with common goals, project planning, and implementation guidelines. Throughout the presentation, best practice methods and techniques leading to optimal efficiency and outcomes are discussed. The presentation also highlights how each chosen vendor has worked together with MEDITECH and their customers through the implementation process. The conclusion of the presentation outlines the required processes to support the interoperability and associated workflows.

Learning objectives:

• How to plan and prepare the implementation using best practice methods and techniques leading to optimal efficiency and outcomes.
• Integrated workflows and downstream effects will be reviewed starting with the technical setup, integration within the MEDITECH platform, and interoperability with reference laboratories.
• A closer examination with illustrations of how Lab and Microbiology dictionaries are leveraged, highlighting the importance of coordinated workstreams and operational communication.

Brandy Barthlama is a qualified healthcare consultant with 13 years of diversified experience in healthcare IT and 19 years of experience as a Registered Nurse. She has extensive MEDITECH experience across all platforms and applications. She has the ability to multi-task and communicate with all levels of staff members across multiple MEDITECH applications including multiple disciplines.

Ann Marie Roman has over 21 years of healthcare IT experience and over 16 years of MEDITECH-specific experience. She has successfully managed multiple complex projects and is able to assist with bridging sensitive cultural and corporate gaps with her positive and flexible approach to project management.

142 – Optimizing Patient Care Through Registries: The Impact of Health Management, Registries, and Care Compass

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Michelle Culbertson and Brandy Barthlama
Organization: Huron Consulting

Patient care is becoming more complex by the day. Are you struggling with how to prioritize your patients? Needing more effective ways to manage high-cost chronic conditions? Are you struggling with ensuring patients are getting the appropriate care throughout the organization? Do you need a real-time monitoring of patients with specific diagnoses? Using MEDITECH’s Health Management, Registries and Care Compass Tools can do this.

MEDITECH has several tools that can be used to improve you patient’s outcomes and improve overall patient care. We will look at three of MEDITECH’s solutions to helping facilities manage their care of patients. We will show how Expanse can be used to leverage your EHR to improve how your prioritization your patients and more effectively manage specific diagnosis whether you have registries or Care Compass. Join us to learn how to transform you patient’s health care experience by using MEDITECH’s Health Management, Registries and Care Compass tools to provide better care of your patients.

Learning objectives:

• Define three ways to improve patient care using Health Management, Registries and/or Care Compass.
• Describe benefits of transitioning to Care Compass.
• Define three to ways to improve patient outcomes.

Michelle Culbertson is a healthcare consultant with 16 years of experience in healthcare IT and 23 years of experience as a Registered Nurse. She has extensive MEDITECH experience across all platforms and applications. She also has a Master's in Nursing Informatics.

Brandy Barthlama is a qualified healthcare consultant with 13 years of diversified experience in healthcare IT and 19 years of experience as a Registered Nurse. She has extensive MEDITECH experience across all platforms and applications. She has the ability to multi-task and communicate with all levels of staff members across multiple MEDITECH applications including multiple disciplines.

143 – The Fundamentals of Fraud Prevention

Track: Support & Technology
Presenters: Sierre Lindgren and Colleen Crist
Organization: Paymerang

Did you know your current check processing is posing risks and exposing your AP payments to payment fraud risks? With internal and external threats on the rise, accounting teams have no time to lose in mitigating the risk of payment fraud, safeguarding sensitive banking information, and ensuring the integrity of the accounting system. Electronic payment solutions, such as virtual cards and ACH transactions, provide greater protections than paper checks, mitigating the risk of payment fraud.

Learning objectives:

• Discuss growing payment fraud risks to your organization.
• Highlight recent payment fraud incidents that have impacted businesses.
• Learn how to safeguard your business payments through e-payments.

Sierre Lindgren is a Senior Fraud Analyst at Paymerang. In addition to overseeing Paymerang’s fraud team, Sierre helps create new fraud mitigation tools, policies, and procedures, and analyzes recent fraud trends and schemes. She also spends time educating business offices nationwide on how to protect themselves from fraud during thought leadership presentations. Before Paymerang, she spent 11 years in the banking industry, with the last five of those years focusing on fraud and investigating ACH, wire, and debit card fraud disputes from customers. Lindgren holds degrees in Psychology and Criminal Justice from Virginia Commonwealth University. When she’s not fighting fraud, she enjoys spending time with her two children and rescue dogs on the Rappahannock River.

As VP of Business Development at Paymerang, Colleen Crist, MBA leads the healthcare business development team by bringing her exceptional skills in business strategy, product development, launch, marketing, sales, and partner development. Since 2016, Colleen has been monumental in the growth of both the Marketing and Partnerships team, and has grown to become a leader in ensuring comprehensive integration and exceptional outcomes for Paymerang. Equipped with an Executive Master of Business Administration degree from Virginia Commonwealth University's School of Business, she drives informed decision-making and is a vital part of Paymerang's success.

144 – You Implemented MaaS – Now It’s Time to Optimize!

Track: Expanse 
Presenters: Lisa Steen and Naomi Smith
Organization: HealthNET Systems Consulting, Inc.

You had an implementation plan that helped you go live successfully with MaaS Expanse. Now you need a post-live optimization plan to truly maximize your MaaS investment. MaaS implementations are fast-paced, so there may be items you couldn’t accomplish by go-live. There are also functions, per MEDITECH, that must wait until post-live or until you’re transferred to service. How do you ensure that your organization will stay focused and won’t lose momentum after go-live? During this session, we will show you how to build your MaaS Post-Live Optimization Plan, and we will provide specific tips and recommendations for clinical and financial areas. Anyone at an organization that has implemented MaaS will find this session beneficial, including IT, clinical, and financial staff.

Learning objectives:

• Identify specific steps to prepare successfully for an organization’s post-live optimization of MaaS.
• Describe several ways clinical areas can succeed.
• Describe several ways financial areas can succeed.

Lisa Steen has implemented every version of MEDITECH – MaaS, Expanse, C/S, and MAGIC. She is a Director at HealthNET Consulting and has more than 25 years of healthcare experience. She has worked in a variety of settings – from critical access hospitals to multi-facility health systems, and has held CIO, Revenue Cycle Director, Privacy Officer, HIM Director, and numerous other roles. In addition to her MEDITECH expertise, Lisa is also skilled in athenaHealth, MS SQL, Oracle, SAS, 3M Encoder, HL7 & FHIR file transfer, and various other systems. She brings an extensive knowledge of Clinical and Financial workflow processes to all of her engagements.

Naomi Smith is a Senior Clinical Consultant with HealthNET Consulting. She has 30+ years of MEDITECH experience (MAGIC, C/S, and Expanse – including MaaS), and is well-versed in the design, technical configuration, application build, and training of all clinical, administrative, and patient portal modules. She is exceptional in providing one-on-one physician training. In addition to her MEDITECH expertise, Naomi is also skilled in NextGen, athenaHealth, Dragon, DrFirst/RCopia, Imprivata, MS SharePoint, Laboratory Instrument Interfaces, HL7 interfaces, and various other systems.

145 – Defending Your Revenue: Model, Analyze, and Optimize

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Ken Jackson
Organization: SlicedHealth

In the dynamic healthcare landscape, financial stability is paramount for providers facing challenges such as thin profit margins, escalating labor costs, mounting expenses, lengthened payment cycles, and the keystone – contractual denials and underpayments contributing to revenue loss. Recent studies underscore the urgency to address these issues, revealing that claim denials have surged significantly. A Kaufman Hall report indicated a remarkable 100% increase in claim denials from 2021 to 2022, with approximately 67% of healthcare leaders reporting higher denial rates. Additionally, Federal investigations found that 18% of Medicare Advantage payment denials were inaccurately declined.

The current environment is marked by complex payment methodologies, automated algorithms employed by payers to deny claims, and a need for more staffing to review payments for accuracy. The need for a more structured approach to ensure payment accuracy and timing, maintain contracts, and provide reliable information on payer performance adds to the mounting frustrations.

This educational session delves into the critical topic of revenue capture within the healthcare sector. Recognizing revenue leakage's complexities, we aim to equip healthcare providers with knowledge and strategies to navigate these challenges successfully.

Learning objectives:

• Identify strategies to combat claims denials and payment inaccuracies. Systematic approaches to give patients estimates and receive payment.
• Streamline contract management processes and strategies to mitigate the repercussions of staffing shortages and identify systematic payer underpayments.
• Unlock the power of data-driven decision-making in managing contracts. Discover how to access critical information on payer performance, track denials and underpayments, and reduce time to payment.

With a 31-year background in healthcare, including a nine-year tenure at Tenet Health, Ken Jackson, Chief Client Officer at SlicedHealth, is a seasoned professional and former community hospital CFO/COO. His expertise includes client-facing positions at HMS/MedHost, Nextgen, and athenahealth. Ken has been instrumental in helping healthcare organizations convert revenue losses into robust protection strategies. Ken additionally has five years of public accounting (auditing & consulting) experience, making his versatile experience uniquely positioning him to comprehend the intricate challenges hospitals face. Ken recognizes technology's importance in utilizing pertinent data to uncover potential revenue gaps, underscoring his commitment to navigating hospitals through the complex landscape of financial sustainability.

146 – Challenges Faced and Mitigation Strategies that Kept our Expanse Implementation On Time and On Budget!

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Shekeria Gilbert and Pam Watson
Organization: Doctors Hospital Bahamas; medSR

Embarking on a massive implementation project is never an easy task. Doctors Hospital Bahamas will share its journey, including challenges and mitigations, during their Expanse implementation. They will also share how they significantly enhanced patient care, data management, and disaster recover capabilities while keeping their project on time and on budget. We can't provide a Pina Colada, but we will share some "island flair and wisdom!"

Learning objectives:

• Participant will learn what steps Doctors Hospital took in advance to prepare for their project and how their strategies impacted the project.
• Participant will learn strategies to overcome such challenges as limited IT and clinical staffing, data conversion, disaster recovery, web responsiveness, and concurrent system growth.
• Delaying a project is expensive! Participants will learn how Doctors Hospital kept their project on time and on budget.

Shekeria Gilbert is a Clinical Analyst Supervisor and Registered Nurse with a demonstrated history of working in the hospital and health care industry. She is skilled in Electronic Health Record, Healthcare, Basic Life Support, Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation, Advanced Cardiac Life Support, and Pediatric Advanced Life Support. She is a strong healthcare services professional with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from University of The Bahamas.

Pam Watson is the Director of Implementation Services for medSR. She is an RN and has experience as a Nurse Manager, Informaticist, and Project Manager. Pam has led numerous Expanse projects and is responsible for oversight of medSR’s project methodology and program management.

147 – People Over Paperwork: Strategies to Prioritize Patient Care and Staff Well Being Over Burdensome Paper Processes

Track: Support & Technology
Presenters: Amy Leopold and Dessiree Paoli
Organization: Forward Advantage; Interlace Health

Is your staff still burdened with paper workflows, in an era with so many promises of paperless? With innovative technologies and automated faxing and document workflows, it can be frustrating to still be spending so much time and staff resources on paper-based and manual workflows. By optimizing current processes and leveraging existing solutions, hospital and physician practice staff can realize efficiencies and relieve the burden of dealing with paper.

In this session, we will share strategies on implementing new workflow tools and communication methods that can eliminate the need for printing and scanning, physical fax machines, paper forms, and help solve the ongoing challenges of overburdened staff and limited resources. We will also discuss specific ways other MEDITECH hospitals have accomplished this.

Learning objectives:

• Understand ways to create more efficient electronic workflows for forms and faxing and how to remove duplicate tasks from processes.
• Strategies to leverage existing solutions to solve workflow challenges.
• Efficient ways to streamline the filing of documents automatically to the patient chart and other ways to free staff from the burden of focusing on paper over patients.

Amy Leopold is a healthcare marketing and product professional and the Director of Product Marketing at Forward Advantage. Amy works closely with commercial, product and development teams to bring new technologies to market. In most of her 15+ years of experience in marketing and product management, Amy has focused her work on understanding healthcare organization challenges and helping to solve those challenges in areas such as information exchange, provider workflows, and intelligent automations. 

Dessiree Paoli is the Director of Product Marketing & Strategy at Interlace Health.

148 – How to Leverage Collaboration to Boost Revenue and Satisfaction

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Christine Fontaine
Organization: Waystar

A healthy revenue cycle relies on strong revenue capture – receiving full, appropriate reimbursement for the care your organization delivers. Many organizations underestimate what it really takes to maximize revenue efficiency: collaboration across functions and among stakeholders.

To create a more efficient workflow for staff and a healthier revenue cycle for your organization, every part of the revenue cycle – front, middle, back, and patient financial services – must play a role in optimization. This means working as an organization to decrease denials, capture all appropriate charges and increase profitability through efficient processes. By establishing interconnected KPIs and education patients at every stage, you’ll also lead to a better patient experience.

Learning objectives:

• Uncover steps to transform your revenue cycle into a truly collaborative endeavor. Explore how to automate the process of financially clearing a patient to prevent frontend denials.
• Ensure all appropriate charges are included on claims submitted to payers. Streamline claim and payer management processes to increase revenue and better manage AR.
• Help patients understand their financial responsibility while optimizing your payment collection process.

Christine Fontaine is currently a Growth Enablement Solution Strategist at Waystar. As part of her role, she assists healthcare providers identify solutions to help optimize their revenue cycle. Prior to joining Waystar, she was Vice President, Revenue Cycle Solutions with Optum360. Christine has been in the healthcare finance field for over 20 years, in both physician and hospital business offices. She has held management positions at Memorial Sloan Kettering, Montefiore Medical Center, Cornerstone Treatment Facilities and Shore Health System/University of Maryland Medical System. 

Christine is a Certified Healthcare Financial Professional, and is actively involved in AAHAM and HFMA. She served on the HFMA Board of Examiners, National Advisory Council and Revenue Cycle Forum. She has presented at HFMA, AAHAM, MEDITECH, and other conferences on various topics related to revenue cycle operations.

149 – Optimize the Physician Workflow within the Ambulatory Setting

Presenters: Brian Pereira and Dr. Andy Burchett
Organization: MEDITECH  

Are you utilizing the system to its fullest potential? Do you feel efficient in your day-to-day utilization of the software? Do you feel satisfied with your workflow within Ambulatory Chart / Documentation / Ordering, or could you use a refresher on ways to promote efficiency? This session will walk through features and functions to optimize the Physician Workflow within the Ambulatory setting.

Learning objectives:

• Review helpful features within Expanse Ambulatory Chart, Documentation and Ordering functionality.
• Review key user preferences that can help optimize your daily workflow.
• Ensure you are aware of the options available to you as a provider to help you get the most out of your Expanse system.

Brian Pereira is a Senior Analyst in MEDITECH’s Client Services Division with over 10 years of experience within the Physician Products. He serves as a subject matter expert for the Physician Ordering products and all integrated applications, specializing in Hold Queue, Other Vendor, and variety of Acute/AMB workflows. Brian has led numerous customer visits and optimizations to improve MEDITECH processes at organizations across the country and has a passion for improving the user experience. Brian advocates for superior customer service and improving physician processes across all applications.

Andrew Burchett, DO, recently joined MEDITECH as Executive Director of Medical Informatics. Dr. Burchett has been a physician with Avera Health since 2006 and continues to practice part-time in Hospice and Palliative Medicine at Avera McKennan Hospital in Sioux Falls, SD. He has a wealth of experience using MEDITECH’s platforms, as well as other vendor systems. He also served as Avera’s corporate Medical Information Officer from 2007-2019 and as the CMIO from 2019-2022, implementing Expanse across 38 hospitals, and 300 clinics in five states.

150 – Optimize the Physician Workflow within the Acute Setting

Presenter: Brian Pereira
Organization: MEDITECH  

In the demanding and dynamic environment of acute care, maximizing physician efficiency is crucial for reducing physician burnout, patient well-being, and healthcare system sustainability. This session delves into strategies and helpful tips to enhance physician performance while maintaining high-quality care.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how to identify areas in need of improvement.
• Learn how to balance efficiency with maintaining high-quality patient care.
• Identify practical strategies to improve physician workflow and reduce inefficiencies.

Brian Pereira is a Senior Analyst in MEDITECH’s Client Services Division with over 10 years of experience within the Physician Products. He serves as a subject matter expert for the Physician Ordering products and all integrated applications, specializing in Hold Queue, Other Vendor, and variety of Acute/AMB workflows. Brian has led numerous customer visits and optimizations to improve MEDITECH processes at organizations across the country and has a passion for improving the user experience. Brian advocates for superior customer service and improving physician processes across all applications.

Andrew Burchett, DO, recently joined MEDITECH as Executive Director of Medical Informatics. Dr. Burchett has been a physician with Avera Health since 2006 and continues to practice part-time in Hospice and Palliative Medicine at Avera McKennan Hospital in Sioux Falls, SD. He has a wealth of experience using MEDITECH’s platforms, as well as other vendor systems. He also served as Avera’s corporate Medical Information Officer from 2007-2019 and as the CMIO from 2019-2022, implementing Expanse across 38 hospitals, and 300 clinics in five states.

151 – Using Data to Improve Financial Outcomes

Presenter: Dylan Talkovic
Organization: MEDITECH  

Revenue Cycle statistics are an important part of understanding what areas can be optimized in the system. MEDITECH will provide a Financial Status Desktop demonstration to better equip Revenue Cycle leadership with real-time information to help with decision making. In addition, we will also walk through an example of a Financial Health Check and discuss how to leverage this information in order to identify areas to improve your financial outcomes.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how to navigate within the Financial Status Desktop (FSD).
• Understand how MEDITECH can assist with optimizing Revenue Cycle.

Dylan Talkovic is a Client Services Supervisor at MEDITECH, specializing in Revenue Cycle. Dylan has been at MEDITECH for over 10 years, spending time in both Service and Implementation. On top of his Revenue Cycle expertise, Dylan also spent part of his tenure working with Ambulatory Front Office applications. Dylan's experiences have helped him develop a well-rounded understanding of the Revenue Cycle and helped him to identify other areas of healthcare operations that can directly impact the Revenue Cycle health and efficiency of an organization. Dylan advocates to customers that the Revenue Cycle is significantly more than just what takes place within the walls of a billing office and starts the instant a patient calls to schedule an appointment. In his spare time, Dylan is a Minnesota-based MEDITECH employee who is a High School Varsity Hockey Coach in his spare time.

152 – Authorization Referral Dashboard

Presenter: Matt Chadwell
Organization: MEDITECH  

Navigating the world of referrals can feel like a complex maze, but it doesn’t have to be! MEDITECH will demonstrate enhancements to the Authorization and Referral Management workflow, including the ability to create a referral packet. Learn more about the future of referrals with MEDITECH!

Learning objectives:

• Learn about the latest enhancements to the Authorization and Referral Management workflow.
• Learn how to navigate and track referrals via the Referral Management Dashboard.
• Learn how to create packets for external referrals.

Matt Chadwell is a Certified Product Manager (CPM) with over 22 years of experience within healthcare Revenue Cycle Management. He has responsibility for all revenue cycle products and initiatives, within all venues of care, to ensure market and customer satisfaction while aligning with MEDITECH's corporate vision and strategy. Matt has a passion for maximizing existing features, and helping to develop new features and solutions based on industry research, experience, and interaction with customers, prospects, and patient populations. Matt is supportive of the MEDITECH revenue cycle vision of providing innovative, efficient solutions that contribute to a positive user and patient experience.

153 – MEDITECH Strategic Clinical Roadmap Review

Presenter: Rebecca Lancaster
Organization: MEDITECH  

Learn about MEDITECH’s strategic vision for our solutions. This session will include a focus on Ambulatory, physician, nurse, pharmacy, oncology, lab, and homecare, to name a few.

Learning objectives:

• Gain insights into what is coming in MEDITECH’s solutions.
• Review MEDITECH’s 24-month strategy.
• Understand trends that are moving MEDITECH strategy forward.

Rebecca Lancaster, CPM, is a Director over Product Management. In her role, she oversees the strategic direction for Physician, Nursing/Surgical Services, Oncology, LTC, BH, Home Care, Outpatient Clinics, apps, and LAB initiatives. Rebecca has been with MEDITECH for over 26 years and has supported physician and nursing products across all platforms in Implementation and Service. Prior to joining the Product Manager group, Rebecca was a manager overseeing physician products in Client Services. Rebecca is an AIPMM certified product manager.

154 – MEDITECH Revenue Cycle Strategic Roadmap Review

Presenter: Matt Chadwell
Organization: MEDITECH  

The ever-evolving healthcare landscape presents significant challenges for revenue cycle management (RCM). MEDITECH will outline a strategic roadmap to address these challenges and optimize financial performance. Rising administrative costs, complex regulations, and patient financial responsibility all contribute to RCM difficulties. We'll explore data-driven approaches, automation of workflows, and patient engagement strategies to streamline processes and improve collections within MEDITECH Expanse.  

Learning objectives:

• Gain insights and begin preparations for MEDITECH’s latest solutions.
• Review MEDITECH’s 24-month strategy.
• Understand trends that are moving MEDITECH strategy forward.

Matt Chadwell is a Certified Product Manager (CPM) with over 22 years of experience within healthcare Revenue Cycle Management. He has responsibility for all revenue cycle products and initiatives, within all venues of care, to ensure market and customer satisfaction while aligning with MEDITECH's corporate vision and strategy. Matt has a passion for maximizing existing features, and helping to develop new features and solutions based on industry research, experience, and interaction with customers, prospects, and patient populations. Matt is supportive of the MEDITECH revenue cycle vision of providing innovative, efficient solutions that contribute to a positive user and patient experience.

155 – Creating the Path to Precision

Presenter: Jen Ford
Organization: MEDITECH  

Come hear how the triangle of MEDITECH’s new Expanse Pathology, Expanse Genomics, and Expanse Oncology are transforming the way clinicians practice and changing the meaning of true precision medicine within the EHR.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how MEDITECH has leveraged Genomics, Pathology, and Oncology to provide real time therapies and clinical trials matching based on genetic markers.
• See firsthand MEDITECH’s new Expanse Pathology solution.
• What’s trending in the market surrounding genomics, cancer care, and precision medicine?
• Hear about the future of interoperability, clinical trials, and precision medicine leveraging groundbreaking technology.

Jennifer Ford is a Manager of Strategy who works with the leadership of MEDITECH, development, marketing, and service as well as customers and industry representatives to drive the future strategy of Clinical solutions within Electronic Health Records. Jennifer believes that it is necessary for EHRs to take a leading role in providing access to the newest technologies in order to drive efficiencies, satisfaction, and minimize burn out across the board. After spending nearly a decade working on the forefront of customer collaboration with MEDITECH solutions, and devoting many years working across the industry to bring advanced data such as Genomics into the EHR, Jennifer understands the needs of the community from many different facets.  

Jennifer holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Marketing and an MBA with a focus in Management from Providence College.  She also holds Certificates of Genetics, Cancer Genomics and Precision Medicine, and Genetic Testing and Sequencing Technologies from Harvard Medical.

156 – Optimizing Physicians’ Time with Expanse NOW

Presenter: Rebecca Lancaster
Organization: MEDITECH  

Now more than ever, physicians are relying on their smartphones to help optimize the time they spend each day responding to messages and refilling prescriptions. Smartphones have even become ambient listening tools to assist in documentation. Come hear the exciting new features added to MEDITECH’s physician app.

Learning objectives:

• Learn what is new in Expanse Now with ordering, documentation, and rounding List.
• Introducing ambient listening to Expanse Now.
• Understand how Expanse Now can reduce burden and friction to optimize physician time.
• Review the implementation process and tracks for ambulatory and acute workflows.

Rebecca Lancaster, CPM, is a Director over Product Management. In her role, she oversees the strategic direction for Physician, Nursing/Surgical Services, Oncology, LTC, BH, Home Care, Outpatient Clinics, apps, and LAB initiatives. Rebecca has been with MEDITECH for over 26 years and has supported physician and nursing products across all platforms in Implementation and Service. Prior to joining the Product Manager group, Rebecca was a manager overseeing physician products in Client Services. Rebecca is an AIPMM certified product manager.

157 – Patient Consumer Health Portal – Modernized, Intuitive, and Agile

Presenter: Siobhan Warner
Organization: MEDITECH  

With a fast-paced consumer driven world, healthcare access needs to be frictionless. With intuitive workflows, and family engagement, the redesigned patient consumer health portal will modernize the IT experience with better speed and agility.

Learning objectives:

• Learn about the redesigned patient consumer health portal including family engagement
• Learn about the new inpatient dashboard
• A look at what’s next on the roadmap  

Siobhan Warner, Product Manager, MEDITECH.

158 – CMS and ONC Regulatory Landscape for 2024 and Beyond

Presenter: Emmy Romain-Amedee
Organization: MEDITECH  

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) continue to evolve their programs and regulations at a rapid pace. We will discuss the latest requirements for 2024 and future years based on the current rulings and programs, including HTI-1, ePrior Authorization, Promoting Interoperability, Quality Payment Program, and more.

Learning objectives:

• Become familiar with the 2024 requirements for the various regulations and how to ensure preparedness.
• Look ahead at CMS and ONC requirements for 2025 and beyond and learn MEDITECH's plans to meet these requirements.
• Learn what steps you need to take in MEDITECH to be prepared for 2024 and future performance years.
• What's trending at the state level?
  
  

Emmy Romain-Amedee is a Senior Regulatory Analyst at MEDITECH, specializing in supporting hospitals with meeting the requirements of the CMS Promoting Interoperability Program. Her expertise lies in providing invaluable regulatory guidance to hospitals, ensuring compliance with EHR requirements. She is involved in crafting internal and external documents, newsletters, and best practices tailored to bolster the program’s objectives. Emmy is also responsible for troubleshooting and resolving issues related to missing data elements crucial for meeting program measures. In her spare time, Emmy enjoys quality time with her family and gets involved in small-business community outreach projects.

159 – Harmonizing Learning Management Strategies in Healthcare

Presenter: Carol Labadini and customer panel
Organization: MEDITECH  

Our panel discussion will focus on the importance and value of having a well-defined Learning Management Strategy (LMS) in one’s organization; one that has a clear position on the various learning content management, delivery methods and expected outcomes, and providing the maximum flexibility to offer and deliver the right level of training for its various constituents.  

Our exploration of Learning Management Strategies in healthcare underscores the importance of finding harmony, flexibility, and compassion in our approach. Thank you for joining us on this enlightening journey towards harmonizing LMS in healthcare.

Learning objectives:

• Hear lessons learned from customer panel regarding  effective tools and demonstrated industry best practices.
• Learn how to cultivate a learning environment that supports growth.
• Lean how to cultivate a learning environment that supports the ‘well-being’ of their workforce.

160 – Bringing Culture, Leadership, and Meaningful Change to Your Department, Hospital, Community, and World

Track: Leadership & Culture
Presenter: Carl Smith
Organization: medSR

How do you bring meaningful culture to your IT department? Are we there simply to put out fires, handle daily maintenance, and look good on a productivity report? Or can we provide an environment that brings purpose and satisfaction to our staff and makes a difference to the organization and communities we serve?

This session will look at ways to promote culture and bring positive and meaningful change to your departments, increase satisfaction in the working environment, and promote positive change outside the walls of your facility.

Learning objectives:

• Identify culture within their facility and department and recognize the importance.
• Become active in their hospital promoting best practices, performance improvement, and excellence.
• Take their IT skills and make a difference in their communities, as well as sharing their insights with the world through various conferences and other avenues.

Carl Smith has been in the healthcare IT Industry for over 30 years. He started his career as a Programmer Analyst at The George Washington University Medical Center in Washington DC, and worked at King's Daughters Medical Center in Brookhaven, MS as the Director of Information Systems and Chief Information Officer. Carl has spoken at many events over the years including MUSE, HIMSS, CIO Executive, and other online educational events. He is currently employed with medSR as Director of Business Development, and serves in a variety of roles within the company.

161 – Methods for Charging Patients for Supplies

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Alan Elefson
Organization: Huron Consulting Group

Charging for supplies in MEDITECH is very important but is not always thoroughly considered. Often, sites are steered into one method that might not be efficient. This presentation will explain all of the methods for charging for supplies in MEDITECH. Pros and cons of using each method will also be reviewed. This way, attendees can gain a better understanding of the methods and ensure their facility uses the best method for their needs.

Learning objectives:

• Attendees will learn the different methods of charging for supplies in MEDITECH that are available.
• Attendees will learn the pros and cons of the different methods of charging for supplies in MEDITECH that are available.
• Attendees will be able to go back to their site to discuss patient charging methods and ensure they are using the best process or combination thereof.

Alan Elefson is a longtime MEDITECH MM and AP consultant who has worked with dozens of hospitals across the country on MEDITECH versions from MAGIC to Expanse. He has presented at MUSE in previous years and is known for his enthusiasm for MEDITECH's recent MM and AP enhancements.    

162 – How Understanding Your SDOH Data Can Inspire Strategic Change in Your Hospital

Track: Population Health & Analytics
Presenter: Megan Howell and Karen McLaughlin
Organization: Augusta Health, Fishersville, Virginia; Medisolv

We will share how the hospital successfully implemented a formal Social Drivers of Health (SDOH) screening process within its MEDITECH EMR, and how it is already using its SDOH data to inform and inspire new efforts to improve patient care. We will explain that while Augusta Health has been committed to collecting its SDOH data and analyzing its performance through a health equity lens for some time, it was motivated to formalize and officially execute the questionnaire once CMS announced its new mandatory health equity requirements. Today, with CMS requiring two new SDOH measures in 2024, Augusta Health is not only prepared to easily submit this required data but also ahead of the game in using it to adopt a new mission statement and strategic plan that puts health equity at the forefront. 

We will provide an overview of the steps Augusta Health took to build its SDOH questionnaire within MEDITECH, including what they learned about asking screening questions in a way that ensures patients understand and feel comfortable answering them in order to capture accurate data. Learn how Augusta implemented the screening within its inpatient and emergency departments and collaborated with case managers to formalize the process of asking the SDOH questions, capturing the responses within the EMR, and connecting patients who respond “yes” to any of the questions with helpful community resources. 

We will also share insights from the SDOH data collected thus far, as in Q3 2023 Augusta Health successfully screened 66% of all inpatients at the hospital, and what they have learned from stratifying this data down into race, gender, ethnicity, and payor type. Learn how Augusta is using this data to pinpoint opportunities to better serve its patient populations and define clear goals in its 2024 health equity strategic plan.

In addition, we will review the new CMS equitable care measures – Hospital Commitment to Health Equity (HCHE), Screening for Social Drivers of Health (SDOH-1) and Screen Positive Rate for Social Drivers of Health (SDOH-2) – and technical considerations for mapping this data within MEDITECH EMRs.

The target audience for this presentation will be hospital managers, CIOs, and others responsible for ensuring MEDITECH EMRs are integrated with CMS reporting mandates, including the new SDOH measures. The case study will be especially relevant to those in small, community-based hospitals.

Learning objectives:

• Build a questionnaire to capture CMS’s required SDOH data, while crafting the questions in a way that patients will be most likely to understand and willing to answer, in order to capture the most accurate data possible.
• Implement a formal SDOH screening process during patient intake, and successfully prepare staff to ask SDOH questions, capture responses within MEDITECH, and assist patients who answer “yes” to any SDOH questions.
• Understand the types of insights that can be gleaned by capturing SDOH data, and how stratifying this data by race, gender, ethnicity, and other factors can empower hospitals to take strategic steps to better address health equity across its patient populations.

Megan Howell is the Quality Data Management Coordinator for Augusta Health, a 255-bed community hospital in Fishersville, Virginia. In this role, she oversees Augusta Health’s use of the MEDITECH EMR to capture, measure, and submit the hospital’s quality performance measures. Before joining the quality department, she focused on meaningful use for the hospital, managing projects that improved clinical processes, including introducing the Augusta Health mobile health clinic that brings primary care services to patients in their communities. Augusta Health is a member of the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association (VHHA) and actively participates in the VHHA Health Equity Learning Collaborative.

Karen McLaughlin is a Clinical Quality Advisor for Medisolv, where she works with health care providers to implement, monitor, and improve their eCQM performance. She has more than 20 years of experience in health care quality, including many in a hospital setting.

163 – Cyberattack at Mount Graham – The Event, The Recovery, The Aftermath

Track: Other
Presenters: Justin Millar and Steve Matheson
Organizations: Mount Graham Regional Medical Center, Safford, Arizona; BridgeHead Software

Back in September 2023, Mount Graham Regional Medical Center was the victim to a nasty ransomware attack. This unexpected assault quickly galvanized Mt. Graham’s incident response team into action. Threat containment, situational assessments, root cause investigations, adapted clinical and business workflows, recovery processes, and more were all undertaken to return to the facility to full operation in just 11 days. But there was also the less talked about aftermath, such as the hefty administrative burden … the fulfilment and submission of mandatory government reports, media announcements, insurance claims, etc.; the threat of significant fines following the breach from the Department of Health and Human Services; through to the post-event analysis and action plan, such as the roll out of new strategies, processes, and tools to build resilience to deal with modern day cyber warfare.

In this session, we will discuss the ‘before, during, and after’ of the cyberattack, with a frank and open exploration of ‘what went right?’, ‘what went wrong?’, what lessons were learned, and the resulting change to what Justin describes today as ‘the new normal’! You won’t want to miss this real-world examination of the life of a hospital following a cyber event.

Learning objectives:

• What healthcare organizations can expect when a successful cyberattack takes hold.
• Successful strategies that aided Mount Graham’s recovery in just 11 days.
• The lessons learned and since applied to improve the facility’s overall security.

Justin Millar is an accomplished IT leader and entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience. Holding a Master’s in Education Technology from Northern Arizona University, he currently serves as the Director of Information Technology and Security Management at Mt. Graham Regional Medical Center. Alongside his professional pursuits, Justin prioritizes his roles as a dedicated husband and father of three teenagers. Beyond the realm of technology, he is an avid enthusiast of music and 3D printing. As a serial entrepreneur, Justin has founded successful ventures, including a solar company and a website design firm. His approach blends professionalism with a commitment to fostering innovation and excellence.

Steve Matheson is BridgeHead Software’s Product Manager for its data protection solutions. He has previously held leadership roles in high profile organizations focused on data management and data protection, with global experience covering both hardware and software. These include Vice President of Channel Sales for CommVault, Vice President of Sales at Cambridge Computer Systems, and Senior Director of Channel Sales at EMC.

164 – Using AI and Automation in Patient Privacy for Proactive Auditing and Predictive Training Education

Track: Other
Presenter: Demi Borden
Organization: iatricSystems

With thousands of PHI accesses occurring every day, and recent regulations requiring quick turnarounds, patient privacy teams are facing the challenge of not only auditing quickly, but accurately.  In this session, we share how an AI-driven approach to monitoring PHI access helps teams enhance their existing privacy program with proactive auditing, and how the data can be used to provide more predictive employee training. We will also discuss the role of automation and how privacy teams can shift their focus from mundane tasks to more strategic initiatives.

Learning objectives:

• The role of AI and automation in patient privacy teams today.
• How to uncover and solve gaps in your privacy program.
• How to use predictive trends to create tailored education.

Demi Borden is the manager of the customer success team at iatricSystems. Focusing on patient privacy and HIPAA compliance, Demi helps healthcare organizations succeed by educating internal privacy teams on best practices, and providing exceptional support. Demi is an advocate for iatricSystems’ patient privacy customers, acting on feedback to make quality product enhancements, and ensuring each team member’s voice is heard.

165 - Navigating to Expanse: A Community Hospital’s Upgrade Journey

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Billy Green and Trent Lienau
Organizations: Tegria; Broadlawns Medical Center, Des Moines, Iowa
Scheduled: Thursday May 30 at 10:05 am

Don't miss this opportunity to gain valuable insights from a hospital paving the way for successful Expanse adoption. Broadlawns Medical Center is committed to serving the unique needs of their community in the most efficient and effective way possible. Broadlawns is a vital healthcare hub for the patient populations they serve. This dynamic discussion will showcase how they are working to integrate state-of-the-art technology to enhance patient care, improve efficiency and stay competitive in the marketplace. They will share their firsthand experiences and insights on upgrading to MEDITECH Expanse and will delve deeper into their motivations, challenges, and key takeaways throughout the entire upgrade process, from initial planning to post-go-live optimization.

We will uncover critical insights specific to community hospitals including:

• Planning and Preparation: Learn the key considerations, challenges, and resources leveraged for a successful upgrade roadmap.
• Implementation and Go-Live: Explore different implementation strategies, tackle common hurdles, and discover best practices for seamless transition.
• Post-Go-Live and Optimization: Witness the initial impact on clinical workflows and patient care, ongoing challenges encountered, and effective strategies for maximizing Expanse's potential.

In addition, participants will gain valuable perspectives from:

• Hear from diverse voices: A real-world case studies provide a comprehensive understanding of the upgrade journey.
• Interactive Q&A: Engage with the audience to gain additional insights and address specific questions.
• Take away tangible learnings: Leave equipped with practical knowledge and resources to guide your own Expanse upgrade path.

This session is ideal for healthcare organizations considering or currently undertaking a MEDITECH Expanse implementation.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how to establish effective Project Management to ensure a smooth path to success by creating a clear roadmap with milestones, allocating resources efficiently to maximize productivity, and ensuring alignment with organizational goals.
• Understand organizational gaps through a partnership strategy by determining if engaging an experienced EHR Partner will benefit your organization.
• Leverage established tools and techniques by adopting best practices, standardizing workflows, and aligning with industry standards.

Billy Green, Director, Enterprise Systems at Tegria, is a versatile health industry professional and respected project leader, known for his proven knowledge of healthcare information systems and 27+ years of experience in the MEDITECH sector. Using a collaborative approach to building teams, Billy is an experienced project manager with the ability to manage multi-facility installs, creating effective and integrated project structures in which consultants and client teams work together toward well-defined results. Billy has led multiple successful MEDITECH Expanse/6.x implementations, providing project management, program management, leadership, and advisory services.

In addition to project management, Billy’s area of expertise includes multi-facility approaches, system assessments, resource management, change management, implementation, and optimization projects. Billy has extensive knowledge of MEDITECH’s advanced clinical systems including the new Web 2.2 services and utilization of the Web Presentation Layer. Billy is well versed in team building skills, personnel management, and transformational leadership.

Trent Lienau, Senior Systems Analyst at Broadlawns Medical Center, has over 22 years' experience supporting healthcare information systems. Broadlawns Medical Center implemented MEDITECH Client Server in 2006 and recently upgraded to Expanse in 2022. During the Expanse implementation, Trent served as the project manager and helped to coordinate Broadlawns resources. He supported several MEDITECH assets including registration, coding, and revenue cycle. He also supported the data repository to provide hospital staff with analytics using SQL, SSRS, and Tableau.

166 - Drive Patient Experience and Lab Accuracy: A Mobile Phlebotomy Expanse How-To

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Dennis Majeski
Organization: CereCore

Blood draws are a routine lab that patients want right, and Mobile Phlebotomy can help ensure specimen accuracy with bedside label printing. From device configuration to MEDITECH dictionary build and workflow, discover how to setup Mobile Phlebotomy in MEDITECH Expanse 2.2 with a product demonstration and open discussion. Whether your healthcare organization is evaluating Mobile Phlebotomy in Expanse, ready to implement or currently using mobile phlebotomy, this session is for you. Make sure you’re not missing – get configuration tips for optimal Lab workflow and patient experience.

Learning objectives:

• Discover how to setup Mobile Phlebotomy in MEDITECH Expanse 2.2 with a product demonstration and open discussion.
• See the pros and cons to help evaluate Mobile Phlebotomy in Expanse so your healthcare organization is ready to implement or optimize mobile phlebotomy.
• Get configuration tips for optimal lab workflow and patient experience.

Dennis Majeski, Senior Consultant, MEDITECH Professional Services at CereCore, has 20+ years experience assessing and implementing HCIS, has served as a SME in clinical laboratory services, and has healthcare operations experience including HCIS Consultant, Clinical Laboratory Manager, Clinical Laboratory Supervisor, and Medical Technologist and Technical College Instructor - MLT. Dennis is proficient in the following MEDITECH Applications: Laboratory, Certification, MEDITECH READY Laboratory, MEDITECH READY Clinical Lead, MEDITECH READY MIS, and MEDITECH READY Project Management.

167 – Go Beyond the Basics: 7 Expanse Tips & Tricks to Boost Provider Satisfaction

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Jerijah Mobley
Organization: CereCore

Providers often complain EMRs slow them down and involve too many clicks to find what they need. See tips and tricks in this demonstration session to help your organization take advantage of Expanse enhancements and save providers' time. Users who support providers, especially those migrating to Expanse or interested in optimizing Expanse, should attend this session.

After the presentation, the audience will be able to streamline access to routines and help providers personalize the EMR for their preferred workflow-all with the goal of improving provider satisfaction.

Learning objectives:

• Streamline access to routines and help providers personalize the EMR for their preferred workflow-all with the goal of improving provider satisfaction.
• Increase understanding of Expanse features for providers whether migrating or exploring ways to optimize the system for providers.
• See seven tips in action to save providers time and reduce clicks within Expanse from access to status boards, widgets, charts, documentation and more.

Jerijah Mobley, BSN, RN is a consultant with CereCore MEDITECH Professional Services with 18 years of experience in the healthcare field as a nurse. He has 13 years supporting providers through multiple MEDITECH Implementations.

168 – Cybersecurity – A Roadmap and a Program

Track: Other
Presenter: John Gomez
Organization: CloudWave

Join us for this two-hour session on developing cybersecurity plans, objectives, and programs.

Hour one: Developing a Cybersecurity Roadmap
This section will guide you through effective practices on developing a meaningful and useful cybersecurity roadmap. Although many organizations establish objectives for their cybersecurity program, they rarely, if ever, develop a comprehensive cybersecurity roadmap. The lack of a roadmap leads to difficulties in answering executive inquiries regarding the organization's strategy's long-term evolution. The lack of a cybersecurity roadmap also makes it difficult for those outside IT Security or Compliance to engage in meaningful strategic conversations. 

In this section, you will learn: 

• Understanding the value of roadmaps in cybersecurity
• Common roadmap pitfalls
• Tracking and reporting progress
• Utilizing agile practices in cybersecurity
• Effective priority management

Hour two: Establishing a Metrics-Driven Cybersecurity Program
This section will guide you through effective practices in developing a meaningful and useful metric driven cybersecurity program. The institution of a metric-driven cybersecurity program is a sign of cybersecurity maturity. It is also a powerful way to describe progress and achievements that can help bridge understanding between business units. 

In this section, you will learn: 

• Why cybersecurity metrics matter?
• Identifying critical cybersecurity metrics
• Utilizing cybersecurity metrics to drive change
• Tracking and reporting cybersecurity metrics effectively

John Gomez is the Chief Security and Engineering Officer for CloudWave. Before joining CloudWave, John was the founder and CEO of Sensato, a cybersecurity solutions provider 100% focused on the healthcare sector. Sensato was acquired by CloudWave. John has a long-time relationship with government agencies like the FDA, DHS, CISA, and others and regularly evaluates potential national threats to critical infrastructure, particularly healthcare. John has been involved in cybersecurity and high technology for more than three decades. John has lectured on cybersecurity and physical security worldwide. To ensure that his presentations are timely and accurate, John remains extremely hands-on in understanding and evaluating attacks on digital and physical infrastructure. Before founding Sensato, John held executive roles at Allscripts, WebMD, and Microsoft.

169 – Deploying MEDITECH High Availability

Track: Support & Technology
Presenters: Joe Quansah, Nino De La Merced, and Nassim Abouzeid    
Organizations: Tegria; RML Specialty Hospital, Hinsdale, Illinois; MEDITECH
    
Minimizing application disruption for users has always been at odds with keeping systems up to date on security patches and other operating system patches. This panel will discuss how MEDITECH High Availability (HA) can help by introducing additional infrastructure redundancy to keep users online while patches are being applied. We will highlight the additional components required in a HA build and talk through what the patching process can look like for each component, from an IT perspective. Automation is your friend. Lastly, we will review the end user experience impact from a non-HA perspective to an HA perspective.

Learning objectives:

• Understand the value and impact of MEDITECH High Availability and how it can improve overall uptime for MEDITECH Expanse environments.
• Understand what is required to implement MEDITECH High Availability, what components are optional and how to choose what to implement, and understand the additional impact this will place on IT teams during patching windows.
• Learn what MEDITECH High Availability does and does not do and hear from a customer who has had HA deployed for more than a year and the impact on their users.

Joe Quansah, Advanced Server & Storage Engineer, is a long time IT professional and has been part of the Tegria Server and Storage Engineering team for over ten years. He is an active member of the team supporting Tegria's cloud operations supporting MEDITECH as well as many other third-party applications.

Nino De La Merced is a Manager of Clinical Applications. He brings 24 years of experience in Healthcare Information Systems, with the last 15 years dedicated to RMP Specialty Hospital. Over the past five years, as Manager of Clinical Application, he played a pivotal role in leading RML Specialty Hospital through a successful Expanse transition in 2022.

Nassim Abouzeid is the Director, Systems Technology with MEDITECH and has served in a wide variety of roles at MEDITECH over his career.

170 – Paper to Progress: Strategies for Streamlining Remittance and Correspondence Processing

Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Jennifer Gurrant 

In an era dominated by digital transactions, the management of paper remittance and correspondence presents unique challenges for organizations. This presentation explores the nuances of optimizing paper-based remittance and correspondence processing and effective strategies to derive the most value from integrating electronic processes. 

From establishing efficient workflows to leverage technology for automation, the presentation will give practical tips aimed at enhancing accuracy, speed, and overall efficiency, walk through the benefits of enhancing your solution via bank lockbox or self-scanning, and provide insight on what to look for when picking a vendor for paper processing. 

By implementing these strategies, attendees will come away with an in-depth understanding of necessary steps that come with transitioning to a lockbox, the benefits of streamlining processes to reduce errors, all while decreasing manual posting of payments and automating their correspondence flows.

Mastering the art of paper remittance and correspondence processing is essential for organizations seeking to achieve operational effectiveness in today’s digital landscape. By implementing the strategies and solutions discussed in this presentation, organizations will be able to unlock their full revenue potential. The time is now to revolutionize your remittance advice processing and reap the benefits of a streamlined workflow.

Learning objectives:

• Attendees will take away practical tips on enhancing their processes and the benefits integrating a solution aimed at enhancing accuracy, speed, and overall efficiency in remittance advice workflows.
• Learners will be receiving a brief overview remittance processing fundamentals and leave with the many benefits of enhancing their solution through lockbox services or self-scanning methods.
• Attendees will be able to walk away with insight on what to look for in a vendor when selecting a solution for remittance and correspondence processing, allowing them to unlock their full revenue potential.

Jennifer Gurrant brings a wealth of expertise rooted in the intricate world of banking, implementation, and RCM management. Throughout her last 11 years at Quadax, Jenn has ascended ranks from analyst, project manager, account executive and now serves as the Senior Manager for Quadax's EDI Services, where she manages a team of project managers and technicians who assist organizations in streamlining clients’ remittance and correspondence processes. Jennifer's journey at Quadax has not only been defined by career progression, but also by a relentless pursuit of innovation, a keen ability to navigate the intricacies of our industry, and a commitment to delivering unparalleled value to clients and healthcare organizations.

171 – Boone Health's Revenue Rescue Mission: Find Out How a Supply Chain and Charge Capture Assessment Conquered the Impossible!

Track: Other
Presenters: Tony Jerald and Brenda Sexson
Organizations: Experis Health; Boone Health, Columbia, Missouri

As hospital bankruptcies spike to a five-year high, many hospitals are struggling just to keep their doors open. All indicators show this level of distress will continue, particularly in the rural and stand-alone hospitals. With the historic level of economic uncertainty, organizations must look beyond the normal methods used in the past to change this trajectory.

"I think everyone is nervous," David Dunkle, MD, CEO of Franklin, Ind.-based Johnson Memorial Health, told Becker's. "When we get together, it's not, 'How are you doing,' it's, 'How bad are you doing?' Then, 'What are you doing to turn things around?'"

This educational session will highlight the use of a Supply Chain and Charge Capture assessment at Boone Health to look deeply at supply chain core data, operational methodologies, and supply charge capture. Utilizing a Power BI dashboard and creative techniques, this assessment produced 67 actionable supply chain recommendations to work through their current financial and operational concerns.

Learning objectives:

• Understand how outcomes of an assessment can transform into an executable road map with tangible outcomes to reduce operational expenses and increase revenue.
• Insight into the importance and value of completing a supply chain assessment.
• Gain Knowledge how dashboard information can create and sustain a supply chain best practice environment.

Tony Jerald, Director, Financial Applications - Experis Health has been an innovative materials manager, project manager, and health IT professional with more than 25 years of experience. Tony has more than 10 years of experience working directly for hospitals in various roles, including Director of Materials Management. Driven to continually improve, he is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP), Certified Information Systems Risk and Compliance Professional (CISRCP), as well as a certified consultant for MEDITECH’s Expanse EHR platform. He has helped improve organizations with his materials management, implementation, compliance, project management, and financial expertise. This diverse experience has helped shape a well-rounded approach to today's complex issues facing healthcare materials management and IT.

Throughout his career, he has seen the good, bad, and ugly of hospitals across the country. From his perspective, the days of only talking about GPOs, supplies contracting, and JIT inventories are long gone, and it is time to take an innovative approach. As Director of Financial Applications, he is enthusiastic about and privileged to help clients streamline their ERP systems while boosting their revenue stream.

Brenda Sexson, MHA, MT(ASCP), is the Information Services Director at Boone Health and has served in this position for three years. Brenda oversees the MEDITECH EMR as well as an additional 140 applications. Brenda has over 30 years of health IT experience with 25 of that with BJC Healthcare. Brenda started her career in healthcare as a Medical Technologist at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Brenda has a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Emporia State University, Bachelor’s degree in Medical Technology from the University of Kansas and a Masters of Healthcare Administration from Webster University.

172 – Mobility and Expanse

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Christina George
Organization: HCA Healthcare, Nashville, Tennessee

Clinicians today face many challenges at the bedside today. Mobile devices have solved for challenges that were introduced with workstation on wheels. MEDITECH Expanse Point of Care (POC) provides nursing documentation, medication administration, and lab specimen collection using a mobile platform. 

The ability to be mobile improves efficiency by providing real-time access and documentation to the electronic health record (EHR) at the fingertips of our clinicians. The ability to scan the patient, medications, and specimens in real-time using a mobile phone promotes accurate time recording and documentation of events during the patient’s care.

The Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is a structured approach that guides software development. In partnership with MEDITECH, we participated in this process by providing our requirements, thorough testing, internal education development, deployment strategies, and feedback on needed features/enhancements. The ability to use mobile devices by our clinicians has been positively received.

Learning objectives:

• Identify how mobility has positively impacted clinicians.
• Describe three benefits of Expanse POC/PHH on the mobile device.
• Describe the importance of testing workflows and interruptions.

Christina George, Nursing Informatics Manager, is a Registered Nurse working in informatics for over 10 years. She has over 13 years of experience working in non-healthcare Information Technology roles that included computer programming and database analysis. Her background in IT and clinical is an excellent combination in the informatics field.

173 – Rethink Staffing: How Technology Can Help Your Team Focus on Growth

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenters: Kristen Pozmanter and Stephanie Mintor
Organizations: Phreesia; Signature Healthcare, Brockton, Massachusetts

You have great patient access and registration teams, but they are overwhelmed by manual, repetitive tasks, and have less time to focus on revenue-generating activities. How can you create a more sustainable staffing model that fuels your health system’s growth and better leverages your workforce?  
We will discuss how Signature Healthcare is automating insurance verification, improving collections, and streamlining patient communication to scale the organization’s staff and help them work more efficiently. We will also discuss how Signature Healthcare is using digital tools to improve the patient experience and better align staffing with its strategic goals for expansion and growth.

Learning objectives:

• Define how automation can help your organization more efficiently deploy staff.
• Identify ways your organization can use communication and outreach tools to increase patient volume.
• Use automation to scale operations as your organization expands.

Kristen Pozmanter is a Team Lead for Client Solutions at Phreesia, where she focuses on client success, implementation, and project management for enterprise clients. Kristen has worked at Phreesia since 2020 and supported some of Phreesia’s largest health system clients. She’s passionate about creating workflows for clients that maximize efficiency and improve satisfaction. She is a New York native and holds a BS in business administration from the Binghamton University School of Management.

Stephanie Mintor is Manager-Financial and Administrative Applications at Signature Healthcare, where she is passionate about helping people and implementing processes and workflows that create efficiency and improve end user performance. Stephanie has numerous years’ worth of experience managing, supporting, and maintaining financial and administrative applications, and expansive knowledge of the MEDITECH Electronic Health Record system. Her experience includes supporting MEDITECH EHR software upgrades, integrating new vendor solutions, and implementing new workflows. Prior to working at Signature Healthcare, she worked at MEDITECH as a Senior Application Specialist, supporting hospitals across the Northeast and South. A Boston native, Stephanie earned a BS in business management in 2004 from the University of Massachusetts Boston and an MBA in 2009 from Curry College.

174 – EHRxcellence: Tailored Training for Optimal Outcomes

Track: Other
Presenters: Tresa Tarbox and Dwane Anthony
Organization: Sedona Learning Solutions

In today's fast-paced and ever-changing world, the possibilities of choosing EHR training for your staff are boundless. With a myriad of options at your fingertips, it’s a challenge to explore the diverse array of choices available. But wait, let’s home in on something truly spectacular – customized training!

This educational session will cover topics related to the benefits of customized training. The what, who, how, and why will be discussed. The statistical importance of why custom training is better for your staff will be presented.

In this session, you’ll learn: 

• What is customized training
• Who benefits
• How beneficial is it
• Why is it beneficial to my staff

Providing the best EHR training for your staff is a monumental task and a great responsibility. The decision you make is pricey no matter the chosen option, so why not choose the right fit for the investment you’re making?

Learning objectives:

• Session attendees will gain an understanding of the advantages associated with customized training.
• Session attendees will learn the common pitfalls hospitals face when training on a new EHR.
• Session attendees will grasp the statistical significance supporting the superiority of customized training methods.

With over 15 years of dedicated service to EHR training, Tresa Tarbox embarked on a transformative journey in 2008 as Sedona Learning Solutions' inaugural non-owner, full-time staff member. Evolving through various roles, from HR to Finance and now as Director of Learning Operations, Tarbox has become synonymous with Sedona's presence at industry trade shows since 2009. With an unwavering passion for people and employee engagement, she thrives in dynamic environments, adept at problem-solving and fostering meaningful connections. Armed with vast experience, Tarbox is committed to forging lasting relationships and engaging with professionals worldwide.

Dwane Anthony boasts a rich history spanning over a decade in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) training sector, commencing in 2006. Over the years, he has fulfilled diverse roles including clinical instructor, go-live support coordinator, instructor manager, and curriculum design specialist. Leveraging his Project Management Professional (PMP) accreditation, he has successfully overseen numerous hospital training initiatives. Presently, as the Director of Instructional Design and Development at Sedona Learning Solutions, he is dedicated to applying his wealth of experience to assist prospective clients in crafting realistic and tailored.

175 – Expanse Group Patient Scheduling: From Sluggish to Swift

Track: Expanse
Presenter: Michelle Hart
Organization: Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, Toronto, Canada

There are studies that show that in healthcare, group sessions, and workshops can have positive impacts on patient outcomes, not to mention the benefits to healthcare providers. Clinicians at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital often see and treat both ambulatory and acute rehab patients in group settings, ranging from a writing club for patients with brain injuries, to workshops for siblings and other family members, to all-day and overnight groups that help youth with disabilities gain independence. Although ambulatory group scheduling functionality in Expanse is still fairly new, Holland Bloorview jumped at the chance to be able to schedule and check-in groups of patients quickly and effectively.

Learning objectives:

• Understanding the functionality of Ambulatory Group Scheduling.
• Clinicians are in control of their own schedules and can check in their own patients, creating a more efficient workflow.
• Suggested implementation steps for a successful launch of group scheduling.

Michelle Hart has been a MEDITECH Application Specialist at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital for nine years supporting MIS user provisioning, Community Wide Scheduling, Registration, and Patient Health Portal. Prior to joining the MEDITECH team, Michelle was the Appointment Services Manager for 10 years where she participated in numerous project implementations, including the establishment of a coordinated system for referrals and scheduling across the organization.

176 – Expanse and Medical Imaging – Improving Patient Safety

Track: Patient Care
Presenter: Kathryn VanHemme, Manager, Professional Practice Expanse Support Team
Organization: Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre, Barrie, Ontario

This quality improvement initiative sought to launch MEDITECH Expanse and Provider Order Entry in the Medical Imaging Department of a regional acute care facility to improve interprofessional communication, information sharing and patient safety.

Our objective with this initiative was to improve patient care by developing and implementing a hybrid process to utilize Expanse 2.1 PP48 functionality for inpatients of an acute care facility. We needed a hybrid process to bridge the gap between PACS, the Medical Imaging interdepartmental process and the Expanse inpatient process. It appears the incorporation of Expanse in Medical Imaging departments across the country is limited. So began our journey to bring Expanse into the hybrid process of our Medical Imaging department to enhance safe and efficient care transitions between the inpatient and Medical Imaging department.

This quality improvement initiative has required the collaboration of professional practice, medical imaging MRT experts, Expanse clinical analysts, physician and radiologist stakeholders, project lead, and the support of senior leadership. A phased implementation plan was executed with the final phase going live in September of 2023.

Learning objectives:

• Attendees will learn about how Expanse is used in this hybrid process.
• Attendees will learn how the initiative and this new hybrid process has improved interprofessional communication, information sharing and patient safety.
• Attendees will learn about the impact of this initiative to the end-user.

Kathryn VanHemme is the Manager, Professional Practice Expanse Support Team.

177 – Insurance Eligibility (270/271 Transactions) Tips and Tricks

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Terry Mitchell
Organization: Huron Consulting Group

Insurance eligibility provides staff/end users with information including coverage dates, copayment, coinsurance, and deductible amounts, as well as referral requirements and plan benefits for varying medical and mental benefits. Organizations can verify insurance coverage through ANSI 270/271 interface between acute or ambulatory facilities and an insurance verification clearinghouse. Verifying this information prior to a patient's scheduled appointment or arrival promotes a smooth Check In process and mitigates the risk of insurance issues during the billing and claims process. During this presentation, attendees will view additional dictionary setup options with the intent to capture enhanced insurance coverage data with each electronic payer response.

Learning objectives:

• Demonstrate EDI Program Dictionary options to remove the ‘Middle Initial’ (for example) in 271 responses from payers. Differences in middle initial between the 270 request and the 271 response are identified as an error or missing data for review.  Many payers do not require a middle initial on claims.
• Demonstrate Insurance Verification Rule Dictionary options to allow auto verification status when 271 response returns ‘Active Coverage’. Demonstrate EDI Data Element Dictionary options to allow auto verification status and define ‘Active Coverage’.
• Demonstrate additional selections in MIS Communication Field Map (M-AT) dictionary to capture dependent eligibility data.  Dependent data (271 response) may not be available from all payers. Demonstrate enhancement to add ‘Eligibility’ in Relationship Field Map.

Terry Mitchell MHA, Healthcare Manager at Huron Consulting Group, has over 30 years of healthcare project management and revenue cycle management experience. He is well-versed with managing teams of varying skill sets and has in-depth knowledge of MEDITECH EHR implementation, training, process analysis and redesign, policy and procedure development, and change management. Terry has served as Global Program Director, Project Manager, Financial Lead, Revenue Cycle SME, Director of PFS, Director of Patient Access, Interim Director of HIM, CBO Manager of acute and ambulatory facilities, and Physician Practice Administrator.

178 – Leading Edge Cybersecurity for MEDITECH Hospitals

Track: Support & Technology
Presenter: Pat Harkins
Organization: Teknicor
Scheduled: Friday May 31 at 8:30 am

Healthcare organizations and patient care can be drastically impacted by data breaches. Digital health innovation and improved patient can only be achieved with effective data security in place. We will provide insight on observed customer field results combined with recognized best practices. In this session you will learn how we bring together five pillars of cybersecurity into a comprehensive security solution built on the Zero Trust approach and using vital technologies.

Learning objectives:

• Understanding cybersecurity.
• Understanding risks and costs of not being protected.
• Understanding potential approaches to address the risks and costs.

Patrick Harkins is Vice President for Strategic Solutions at Teknicor and has more than 25 years experience in the healthcare sector. He has provided management and technical leadership across many healthcare IT initiatives, ranging in scope from local to the scale of large provincial government. Patrick is an in-demand speaker at major healthcare industry events in the US, Canada, and UK. Patrick’s expertise and insight is built on direct experience as a CTO at major healthcare centres, with accountability for multi-location HIS systems, regional cardiac units, VDI, security, informatics as well as the day-to-day operation of the department.

179 – Optimizing Power BI at Boone Health

Track: Business Intelligence, Quality Management and Reporting
Presenters: Brenda Sexson and Glen D'Abate
Organizations: Boone Health, Columbia, Missouri; Acmeware
Scheduled: Wednesday May 29 at 1:30 pm

In this educational session, we will explore how data available in the MEDITECH EHR can be optimized for data analytics at Boone Health with Microsoft Power BI. Effective business decisions and optimized clinical outcomes are core to the mission of Boone Health, and this can only be accomplished if our decision makers are equipped with easy-to-comprehend solutions presenting accurate information.  

Over the past year, we have been implementing custom Power BI-based data analytics solutions that empower executives and department heads with the necessary insight to make informed decisions.   Presently, this includes Revenue Cycle, Supply Chain, Patients and Visits, Orders, Emergency Department, and Surgical Services. We envision any area of our organization that can benefit from being able to easily analyze the data generated or associated with their department will eventually have Power BI reports or dashboards to support their operations. Moreover, we envision that the metrics being developed at the department level will eventually be rolled up to provide dashboards with insight at the executive / board level providing an efficient, near real-time pulse on the state of business.

Much of this education session will be to demonstrate the Power BI work that has occurred to date, discuss the collaborative and iterative process by which the reports and dashboards were developed, and share our experience.  This remains a work in progress, though development is proceeding rapidly. We will also delve into the process of how the Power BI solutions were generated including how we optimize the primary data source, the Data Repository, how we include third part data (e.g., CMS geometric length-of-stay, budget data, etc.), and how we use Power BI to both translate data and present information in visually informative and intuitive visualizations.

Learning objectives:

• How Microsoft Power BI enables interactive data analytics.
• How insight-driven analytics can lead to improved business decisions and optimized outcomes.
• See many real-world examples of analytical Power BI reports from many functional areas of MEDITECH.

Brenda Sexson, MHA, MT(ASCP), is the Information Services Director at Boone Health and has served in this position for three years. Brenda oversees the MEDITECH EMR as well as an additional 140 applications. Brenda has over 30 years of health IT experience with 25 of that with BJC Healthcare. Brenda started her career in healthcare as a Medical Technologist at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Brenda has a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Emporia State University, Bachelor’s degree in Medical Technology from the University of Kansas and a Masters of Healthcare Administration from Webster University.

Glen D'Abate, CEO, Acmeware Inc., has nearly 40 years’ experience working in the healthcare IT field including 13 years at MEDITECH where he led development of the Data Repository, and over 25 years as president and CEO of Acmeware. Under Glen’s guidance, Acmeware has become the preeminent leader in providing solutions in the MEDITECH EHR space and he is recognized as an innovative leader in data analytics, report design and development, custom applications, and data integration solutions. Glen has an undergraduate degree in Engineering and Economics from Trinity College and graduate degrees in Biomedical Engineering and in Finance from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Boston College, respectively.

180 – Managing Privileged Accounts: Defend Your Organization Against Insider Threats, Third-Party Breaches, and Too Much Access

Track: Support & Technology
Presenter: Lee Howard
Organization: Forward Advantage
Scheduled: Friday May 31 at 9:20 am

Organizations globally are facing increased risk of data breaches, and all too often the risks are made worse by a lack of access security. Privileged accounts are a necessity, but so is managing them responsibly. In this session we will review the challenges of managing privileged access internally and for vendors. Our experts will share best practices for managing, as well as implementing solutions that are best for your organization’s specific needs.

Learning objectives:

• Understand how breaches can occur both internally and by third parties.
• How privileged access can help meet compliance & cyber security requirements.
• How to proactively reduce risk with privileged access and strategies to reduce the risk of a third-party breach.

Lee Howard is Vice President of Client Services for Forward Advantage and has over 20 years of experience in healthcare information technology. Lee oversees the smooth communication between the company and its customers and associates. His teams focus on providing solutions & services for the company’s information exchange & faxing solutions, as well as identity and access management solutions.

181 – How to Keep Pace with Patient Expectations

Track: Patient Engagement
Presenter: Peter White
Organization: Alder Hey Children’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool, UK

Patient access to information continues to increase and expectations are high for care providers to deliver effective solutions. This is particularly apparent for children and young people who have grown up in the information age and expect information and data relating to their care to be easily available. Using a mobile first methodology to develop digital solutions ensures information is easily accessible and provides data from several sources directly to the patient’s preferred device.

This presentation will outline the development of Alder Hey Anywhere: a novel and innovative approach to patient portal development which has been designed with children and young people as the primary user. Alder Hey Anywhere also ensures parents/carers and the clinical teams are able to update, engage and contribute to the solution. Patient experience and minimising effort to ensure effective engagement with the portal and be the primary source for accessing trusted information.

Learning Objectives:

• Discuss challenges facing care providers when developing patient portals, particularly those providing care to children and young people.
• Learn about the development of Alder Hey Anywhere and how it integrates with Meditech Expanse.
• Demonstrate how digital solutions and innovations are developed in the NHS.

Peter White is the Chief Nursing Information Officer at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool, UK.

182 – Outsourced Collection Routines: Improving Inbound / Outbound Solutions

Track: Revenue Cycle and Patient Access
Presenter: Sheryl Easter
Organization: Nordic

Is your Patient Financial Services Team confronted with challenges related to outsourced collections. Do you currently outsource a portion of your collections (i.e., Self-Pay, Auto, Worker’s Comp, Early Out Insurances, Bad Debt) and are you experiencing delays in communication? Does your team face challenges with reconciling what is marked “Outsourced” in MEDITECH and what your third-party vendors’ show?  Do you feel confident that MEDITECH is the source of truth and houses all follow up efforts for improved account management? Do you spend hours reconciling payments/balances, manually managing returns, and challenges moving accounts through the return process that increases delays? If you answered yes to any of the above questions, then join this session for a look at the Journey of Improved Inbound/Outbound solutions. The great news is that MEDITECH Expanse provides the foundation and tools necessary to support optimized outsource collection routines.  

The objective of this presentation is to share details and insights related to the foundation of setting up the Outsource Collection Routine in collaboration with vendors, automating inbound/outbound files, streamlining the return process through tasks/events, enhancing payments through file upload, and automating vendor note posting to ensure that MEDITECH is the source of truth. Examples and workflow designs will be presented.

Learning objectives:

• Learn how to enhance outsource collections through MEDITECH automation of Inbound/Outbound files.
• Gain an increased knowledge of MEDITECH dictionaries to support an improved outsourcing process.
• View of real-life proven workflows payment posting, reconciliation, and bad-debt lifecycle.

Sheryl Easter is a Principal Consultant with Nordic Global Consulting supporting both US and International Organizations. She has over 35 years’ experience working closely with healthcare organizations to help improve their Revenue Cycle and Financial Processes; resulting in increased revenue and decreased avoidable write-offs for the facilities. Sheryl has functioned in various roles including Managing Director-Revenue Cycle & Finance, Project Manager, Senior Management Consultant, and Senior Financial Analyst working in the areas of Patient Financial Services, Patient Access, Scheduling, Materials Management, Authorization/Referral Management, Health Information Management, Abstracting, Payroll, and General Financials. Education has been a key motivator, and after achieving a master’s degree (MBA/HCM) with a large focus on healthcare; became and educator focusing on healthcare regulations, optimizations, changes, and revenue cycle.

183 – Secure Deployments for Expanse

Track: Support & Technology
Presenters: Matt Wear
Organization: Tegria

Securing your EHR is critical, and protecting authentication to the application is an important focus item during implementation. Often times though, items exterior to the EHR can have as significant of a risk to securing your healthcare data. During this talk, we will discuss how items such as the overall network design, systems administration controls, Interfaces, SQL access and data shares can all affect your security posture and discuss strategies to help reduce risk exposure.

Learning objectives:

• Learn about the current threat landscape, vectors of attack to an Expanse environment, and some approaches to securing these environments.
• Better understand how systems adjacent to Expanse can have a profound impact on your overall security posture and some approaches to securing those.
• Learn some of the common configuration mistakes made during implementation can lead to opening an attack vector if not managed during implementation and prior to go live.

Matt Wear, Principal Server & Storage Engineer, has been an IT professional at Tegria for over 20 years. He is the lead engineering resource responsible for leading new technology development, process innovation, and other R&D efforts within the Tegria Cloud Team.

184 – Optimization and Transformation of Expanse Ambulatory

Track: Expanse
Presenters: Wendy Frappier and Al Monteiro
Organization: Healthtech/Nordic

Is your ambulatory facility losing out on potential revenue opportunities due to missing billing components in clinical documentation? Did your organization struggle to integrate clinical quality measures in documentation templates during initial build and are faced with MIPS attestation deadlines and potential penalties from Medicare?

Due to time constraints and limited resources, most organizations manage to implement only the bare basics of the Expanse Ambulatory module. Several key features of the MEDITECH Expanse Ambulatory module like Registries, Widgets, Immunization Management and Health Maintenance protocols are postponed to post-live optimization. Additionally, many facilities lack resources to train providers on advanced clinical documentation tips and techniques like Typicals, Tailored Documentation, and Quick Texts. These techniques are crucial for improving provider satisfaction and clinical documentation turn-around times.

We teamed up with Community Medical Associates (ambulatory facility of Lawrence General Hospital) to tackle many of these issues resulting in outstanding improvements in revenue generation, patient care outcomes, provider satisfaction, and clinical quality metrics. In addition, we conducted regular MEDITECH Skills Assessments and in-depth training for ambulatory support staff at CMA to bridge knowledge gaps and equip them with required tools for future build and support.

Learning objectives:

• How to “charge from documentation” by incorporating billing components in clinical documentation to allow seamless flow of billing codes from provider documentation to the Coding Visit Worklist to boost revenue significantly.
• Harness the power of “Registries” to monitor and report on patient population health based on criteria like age, diagnosis, next immunization/mammography due dates, lab results and query responses.
• Get introduced to various “EHR Excellence Toolkits” provided by MEDITECH for advanced clinical decision support, real surveillance, and continued patient care.

Al Monteiro is an Associate Consultant with Nordic Global Consulting. He is a result-driven healthcare IT professional with over 13 years of MEDITECH experience; the last seven years being focused primarily on MEDITECH Expanse Ambulatory implementation and optimization projects at various facilities across US and Canada. He completed his undergraduate degree in Information Technology Engineering in Pune, India. After completing his Master’s degree in Software Engineering at Kansas State University, he started out as a Clinical Applications Specialist at Coffeyville Regional Medical Center in South-east Kansas where he developed a passion for using technology to make an impact on patient care outcomes. Al Monteiro led the early adoption of MEDITECH’s evidence-based Depression and Suicide Prevention Toolkit at Coffeyville Medical Regional Center’s Ambulatory facility.

Wendy Frappier, Director at Healthtech, has been a healthcare provider and consultant for over 30 years, with extensive knowledge of MEDITECH systems and project management, particularly on large Canadian implementations. Wendy has extensive experience with clinical applications and web applications in Expanse and interface management.

185 – Personalizing Expanse Patient Care

Presenter: Ryan Kushman
Organization: MEDITECH

This session will review the personalization capabilities available within Expanse Patient Care along with MEDITECH's recommendations to ensure your users have an optimized experience.

Learning objectives:

• Understand the value and impact of allowing user personalization
• Learn which areas can be tailored to each user in Expanse Patient Care
• Review MEDITECH's recommendations for optimal user workflow and patient experience 

Ryan Kushman is the Manager of the Expanse Patient Care MEDITECH as a Service Implementation team. For over 12 years, he has been working with nurses, therapists, and dietitians to help implement best practices to ensure each organization has a successful go LIVE. Ryan enjoys collaborating directly with department leads and their staff to help optimize their workflow and works closely with MEDITECH's Product Development team to provide customer feedback to help continue to evolve the Patient Care product.

186 – MEDITECH Alliance: What it Means for MEDITECH Customers

Presenter: Jeff Kimball, AVP, Sales, MEDITECH
Organization: MEDITECH 

MEDITECH has created a network of organizations with proven, successful, and interoperable solutions. Join us to hear how you can take advantage of our official partner program for third-party complementary solutions to the Expanse EHR.

Learning objectives:

• Understand MEDITECH's new public roster of partners and how to leverage them.
• Understand the customer benefits of leveraging a MEDITECH Partner.
• Learn the promotional and benefit features which Alliance partner vendors can take advantage of.

Jeff Kimball has worked at MEDITECH for twenty years in a variety of roles. In his current position as Associate Vice President, he oversees Business Development and Sales Operations where he was instrumental in founding the MEDITECH Alliance, MEDITECH's new partner ecosystem. Together with his team he is working to grow the program and help advance MEDITECH's strategy of making Expanse an open and extensible EHR platform. He is passionate about helping health care organizations find new and innovative ways to solve the health care challenges of today and tomorrow.