It is already the beginning of a new year and the information technology (IT) field has not slowed down once over the holiday season but, in fact, has picked up momentum. If you’ve considered a moving on to greener pastures, dipping your toe in the greater technology pool, or just want a change where you’re technically challenged and justly rewarded, consider the health information technology (HIT) job market for 2016. If you prefer that to make use of your tech skills to impact people’s lives and well-being, you may want to consider an HIT career with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).
The VA developed the integrated electronic health record (iEHR) technology with its Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture (VistA) system and Computerized Patient Record System (CPRS) and has more recently included newer technologies such as tele-health and mobile applications. Collectively, the technology provides an integrated inpatient and outpatient iEHR, and administrative tools to help VA deliver the best quality medical care to veterans. The CPRS is a key component of the Clinical Application and Enterprise Core Services which provides modern, Web-based access to patient records. The major enterprise-wide initiatives include Veterans Relationship Management (VRM), Eliminate Veteran Homelessness (EVH), iEHR, Customer Data Integration Initiative (CDI), Identity and Access Management (IAM), Enterprise Shared Services (ESS), and the Enterprise Mobility Strategy (EMS).
The VA is in the process of migrating the current VistA and CPRS. The ultimate goal of the migration is to bring the EHR towards a more capable and technically upgraded IT and iEHR system based on a flexible, modular design and modern system and software technologies. The VA is required to achieve its strategic health objectives and to meet the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA, 2013), Section 713, mandate which requires delivery of a modernized VistA system by December 31, 2016.
As a technology professional, you have many choices with which to consider in regards to your personal growth and career. There are many industry power-houses that are actively recruiting including the Henry Elliot & Company. Mr Ken Wagner established the Henry Elliot & Company in 1992 with the company name which was derived by his grandfather and father with a vision to create an organization as a market leader with the Caché, MUltifrontal Massively Parallel sparse direct Solver (MUMPS), and healthcare IT Software industry. As a long term business partner of InterSystems Corporation, they offer their clients highly skilled, reputable and reliable consultants, contract programmer, analysts and candidates for direct hire placement exclusively within the Caché, MUMPS Technology Industry Worldwide.
IT architecture – much of the basic foundations with IT architecture includes the use and definition of data modeling and data flow diagrams. Defining the what and how at an initially high level requires buy-in from management, stakeholders, and other decision makers as well as identifying and mitigating risk factors associated with cost, schedule, and performance. The project won’t begin without requirements and architecture with which to design and deploy.
Programming and application development – despite rumors that programming knowledge and experience is a commodity, so much of the architecture will depend on running multiple apps and having the proper framework in place will require a lot of planning. Programming in particular requires having adequate skill sets on the team and the demand is been so great that organizations are unable to keep pace. From backend servers, domain servers, user interfaces, relational databases, and more, programmers will remain sought after for many projects and industries.
Many of the popular programming languages include Structured Query Languages (SQL), Java, JavaScript, C#, Python, and Health Level 7 (HL7) continue to be in great demand as is having a basic understanding of HIT.
Project management – essentially all team members are project managers because having to balance resources, agile development/devops, and funding is not for the faint at heart. Coordination, planning, scheduling, continual and real-time costing, and early identification of technical deficiencies and issues are constantly demanding that all pull the “project load.”
The importance of engineers or developers being skilled in project management has been reported to be 90% among corporations as important or very important. In addition, having the ability to effectively communicate, leadership, planning abilities, team work, budget preparation, project control, risk management, developing approved specifications, strategic alignment, leveraging lessons learned from previous projects are skills that are often highly desired.
Big data – with the advent of technology including Internet of Things (IoT), for example, more data is being generated but having the resources to analyze it has outstripped supply. Most data is typically unstructured and requires a combined skill set of mathematical prowess and programming ability. A background in statistics and probabilities will serve well for which to analyze data as well as experience in the use of various tools such as R, S, SAS, Tableau, MATLAB, and others.
Communicating the results from data analysis and packaging in the form of presentations and charts require someone who is able to convey the meanings and results from processing such data. This may include building dashboards, web sites, writing reports, and more so that the technical jargon is interpreted for the senior managers.
Business intelligence and analytics – typically referred to as BI, business analytics involves understanding the interrelationships of presented facts so that managers including chief information officers (CIOs) who are able to make use of actionable intelligence in the daily operations of a business.
The BI tools today are founded on report designs, ad hoc query utilities, and online analytical processing (OLAP) that are combined to create databases, integrated technology, and portals to support corporate BI applications. The demand for BI and analytical skills would seem obvious but typically the average business user does not possess BI tools knowledge experience, they use Microsoft Excel as the de facto BI tool instead, incorrectly assume that the data warehouse will take care of information delivery and presentation, and some will inadvertently select the wrong BI tools without due diligence and basing it on sound requirement principles.
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