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FROM THE
CEO
In this edition:
- Coding Workforce Submission to DoHA
- Licence Agreement in Middle East
- NSW PD Event
- Qld Barefoot Bowls Day
- Submission on WA Privatisation of
Medical Records Services
- WA : Health Professional Status for HIMs
- PDP Program
- HIMAA Conference
- Video of PD Events
- Victorian Record Keeping Standard for
Strategic Management
Coding Workforce Submission to DoHA
At the request of the Department of Health
and Ageing (DoHA), the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW)
recently completed an extensive survey of the Australian
clinical coding workforce.
Independent of, but concurrent with, the
AIHW survey's submission HIMAA made a separate submission on the
clinical coder workforce to DoHA. The summary and recommendations of
the HIMAA submission are as follows:
In summary, HIMAA considers the major
impediments to an enhanced clinical coder workforce to be:
- The preparedness/capacity of
healthcare facilities to fund the additional positions required
to handle Activity Based Funding,
- The capacity of hospitals to mentor
newly qualified clinical coders into the workforce, and
- A viable career structure for
clinical coders.
Measures that the Commonwealth might
consider in addressing the above include:
- A form of special purpose funding to
enable hospitals to establish workplace mentors/educators;
- The encouragement of jurisdictions,
where appropriate, to address the issue of viable career
structures for clinical coders;
- Support to HIMAA to facilitate
the development of full AQTF qualifications in clinical coding;
and
- Workshops/seminars to better educate
the workforce on the impact of Activity Based Funding on
clinical classification/clinical coders (perhaps as the next
step after the AIHW report).
Whilst this letter has focused on the
clinical coding workforce, it must be said that
the imminent changes in healthcare will also place significant
demands on the Health Information Manager (HIM) workforce, which is
also under resourced. HIMs will be critical in driving quality
clinical documentation (an essential prerequisite to quality
coding),
overall data quality, the integration of new information systems and
the interfaces between information systems.
HIMAA trusts that DoHA sees fit to
include these comments and recommendations in
its consideration of the AIHW report. As the primary provider of
clinical coder training
in Australia and as an association with many of its members involved
in clinical coding activities, HIMAA is available and prepared to
cooperate with DoHA to support the
changes that Activity Based Funding will bring to healthcare.
License
Agreement in the Middle East
On the 9th July
2010, HIMAA executed an exclusive license agreement with MedFormatix,
a Riyadh based training company, for the delivery of HIMAA's courses
in Comprehensive Medical Terminology and Clinical Coding (to
Intermediate Course level) in the Middle East. Initially training
will be centred on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Abid Al-Badr (MD,
MedFormatix) and Vicki Bennett (President, HIMAA) signed the license
agreement at HIMAA's office in North Ryde, Sydney.
Over the ensuing
weeks HIMAA will assist MedFormatix in the recruitment of a suitably
qualified person to begin the training program. The person will be
employed by MedFormatix, in Riyadh.
NSW PD Event
The NSW Branch held a very informative and
well attended PD morning at the
Petersham RSL Club on the 26th of July. Presentations were given by:
- Irene Simatos: Head Teacher of
Management and Small Business at the NSW
TAFE - Sydney Institute, St George College: Presenting a
Business Case.
- John McAteer: Principal Privacy Officer
for Privacy NSW: Current Status and
Recent Changes to Privacy in NSW.
Congratulations to Jo Chicco, Susan
Claessen and Anne Kellar for another excellent PD event.
Qld Network Barefoot Bowls Day
HIMAA Queensland Network was proud to host
a barefoot bowls afternoon on Saturday 24th of July at the
picturesque Merthyr Bowls Club along the Brisbane River. Despite
the chilly weather (around 20 degrees that day) there was a great
turnout of HIMs
(and respective partners) from the Gold Coast in the South through
to Redcliffe-
Caboolture in the north.
The afternoon offered the HIM community a
fantastic opportunity to let their hair down over a few beers (at
1972 prices) and certainly produced lots of laughs.
After receiving instructions from the resident bowling instructor it
was on for young and
old. There were some interesting techniques out on the green
(occasionally they actually hit the mark or the jack as the case may
be). The best bowlers of the day, as voted by
the teams, were Thai Le (HIM) and Neil Cope (partner to Michelle
Leeding - Redcliffe HIM).
After two hours of bowling, the bowlers
were rewarded with a sumptuous gourmet BBQ cooked by our chef from
Merlo catering (Brisvegas institution). Lucky door prizes
(wine & chocolates) were drawn and the Gold Coast HIMs went home
happy - congratulations to Kate & Katherine. The grand prize of
a full registration to the upcoming HIMAA conference in Sydney also
went to a Gold Coast based HIM - congratulations to Rajbir Kaur.
A great time was had by all who came along,
new friends were made and old ones reconnected.
The HIMAA Queensland Network looks forward
to inviting all Health Information Managers, Clinical Coders and
other interested professionals to the next event - HIMAAQ
Professional Development Day - being held on 24th September in
Brisbane. More details to come.
Photos of the barefoot bowls afternoon can
be seen below.
Submission on WA Privatisation of
Medical Records Services
In late 2009 the WA Government let a tender
for the privatisation of a range of functions
in the public healthcare system, including medical records services.
HIMAA is in the
process of developing a submission to the WA Government highlighting
the issues that HIMAA believes need to be addressed if the
government elects to proceed with this initiative.
WA : Health Professional Status for HIMs
The Western Australian branch of HIMAA is
coordinating the push to raise the status of
WA Health Information Managers to Health Professional. The Health
Services Union (HSU) has met with the branch executive and is
supportive of this exercise. The branch and HIMAA National
Office jointly funded a consultant to prepare the submission which
will be used by the HSU to demonstrate to WA Health the work value
of the Health Information Management profession. The draft document
will be sent out to WA HIMs for comment in early August before
being given to the HSU to proceed.
PDP Program
The HIMAA PDP Program has been available
for a number of years but has not
attracted a great deal of support. Hence the HIMAA Board has taken
the decision to terminate the program, releasing the funds allocated
to the fund for other purposes.
All current funding commitments will be met.
HIMAA Conference
All keynote speakers and papers are now
confirmed for the 2010 HIMAA National Conference and the conference
program is available HERE
Conference registration can be done online HERE
Conference travel and accommodation can be
booked online HERE
Video of PD Events
The HIMAA National Office has commenced a
program of acquiring videos of PD events
and posting the videos (with supporting Powerpoint presentations
when available) to
the Members' area of the HIMAA website.
The aim of the program is to:
- Make PD events accessible to more
members, particularly those in rural and remote locations; and
- Develop a resource centre for members.
Currently acquired and planned videos of
the following PD events are/will be posted to
the website:
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Branch
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Date
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Subject
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Comments
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NSW
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8th
March 2010
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Episode
Based Funding in NSW
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Awaiting
posting
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NSW
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8th
March 2010
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Current
Topics in Health Information Management in
Australia
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Awaiting
posting
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NSW
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26
July 2010
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Presenting
a Business Case
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Available
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NSW
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26
July 2010
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Current
Status and Recent Changes to Privacy in NSW
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Available
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VIC
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24
August 2010
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Professional
development and challenges facing health
information professionals in the
USA
.
The
national health reform agenda and activity
based funding strategies.
Implementing
Cerner Provision Document Imaging (CPDI) Medical
Record Scanning at Alfred Health.
Implementing the
3M scanned record at Goulburn Valley
Health -
lessons learned.
Impact
of coding
using a scanned medical record.
Health
informatics standards development – identifier
standards and how it impacts HIM's.
Working
for the
Royal
Australian
College
of General Practitioners.
HIMAA
strategies to address the changing workforce
needs.
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Scheduled
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QLD
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24th
September 2010
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TBA
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Scheduled
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Whilst we are working at bringing the first
NSW PD Events as quickly as possible, we have made the latest NSW PD
Event, for the 26 July 2010, available here.
(Member-only login).
Victorian Record Keeping Standard for
Strategic Management
The Victorian Recordkeeping Standard for
Strategic Management is now available on
the Public Record Office Victoria (PROV) website. Click on the link
below to view the documents via the Public Records Office of
Victoria (PROV) blog.
If you have any comments, PROV encourages you to post them directly
on the blog or alternatively, you can email them to standards@prov.vic.gov.au.
Your feedback would be greatly appreciated and will be used to
improve the quality of these documents
when they are next reviewed.
Strategic Management (PROS 10/10) http://bit.ly/9cGQbs
If you would like to know more about the
PROV Recordkeeping Standards Project,
please see the PROV website at: www.prov.vic.gov.au/recordkeepingstandards
Until next time...
Bob Blue
HIMAA CEO
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NEWS IN BRIEF
NEHTA, vendors
lock horns over HI service
The $90 million Healthcare Identifier system intended to help save
patients' lives is sitting idle as key components do not exist. And
there are no plans in place to make the service available where it
is most needed - in GPs' offices. Doctors and medical software
developers are "bitterly disappointed" that it will be
years before patients see any benefits from the new HI service…
Although Medicare allocated a 16-digit unique patient identity
number to every Australian in its database on July 1… the number
is only available by phone and cannot be used by anyone.
The Australian.
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Two-year wait for health
e-records
Patients will have to wait at least
two years before they can access medical records online, federal
Health Minister Nicola Roxon says. Initially, only Medicare would
operate a secure website or portal that would allow patients to
retrieve their personally controlled electronic health records, she
said. But she left the door open for other service providers, such
as health insurance providers, to manage patients' e-health records
in future. The Australian.
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iSoft
Group Limited completes e-health roll-out at Macquarie University
Hospital
iSOFT Group Limited has installed a host of e-health systems at
Macquarie University Hospital in Sydney in time for the new 199-bed,
state-of-the-art hospital to operate paper-free from day one, under
a A$7.8 million deal agreed in March 2010. ABN Newswire.
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iSOFT
rolls out statewide patient management system in Tasmania
All public hospitals in Tasmania now have access to up-to-date
patient information with iSOFT's patient management system. More
than 5,000 clinical staff across Tasmania benefit from the roll out,
which will improve patient care, efficiency and productivity. The
state previously had three separate databases of patient data, but
the new system has consolidated more than 6.5 million records into
one standard database serving all of Tasmania. Healthcare IT
News.
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THE
private details of Queensland Health patients are at risk of being
lost or stolen and there are inadequate plans to deal with a major
security breach.
But the troubled department is racing to implement computerised
medical records. The Auditor-General's report into information
systems governance and control has identified gaps in protocol in
Queensland Health and seven other government agencies. These gaps
could have serious impacts on security and the privacy of
information. In some departments, security is considered to be
consistent with that of a "medium sized business", as
opposed to a complex state department holding and processing
sensitive information. At Queensland Health, the report labelled the
control environment for patient information storage and technology
infrastructure "satisfactory", but found security gaps and
a failure to prepare for how the system would respond in a disaster.
Courier Mail.
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E-health records
to be accessed via 'portal'
The Labor government's much-vaunted
"personally-controlled" e-health records system will be
delivered via a "portal", but with health bureaucrats
still "mapping out the build" the option for outsourcing
to platforms like Microsoft's HealthVault or Google Health remains
on the table. .. Health spokeswoman Raelene Thompson said the
intention was for patients and doctors to access personal records
through a web portal, from any location including a home
PC."The concept is for a voluntary system, and only those
people who wish to use an e-health record will have one, and what
goes into that record and who is allowed to access it will be within
their control," Ms Thompson said. The Australian.
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News in Full available on our site here
(Members only)
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