April 18-24 marked Health Information Professionals (HIP) Week. Here at Fenway Health, our Informatics and Data team members play a critical role every day in ensuring that we deliver the best possible care to our patients and clients. As the official HIP Week site notes, these professionals “possess a uniquely comprehensive view of a resource critical to meaningful health innovation. In medical coding, clinical documentation integrity, data analytics, management, privacy, security, and beyond, [they] empower [their] partners in healthcare to provide high-quality, lifesaving care.” The expertise of our HIP staff members was even more critically needed during the past year’s COVID-19 pandemic.
Let’s take a look at the many ways that Fenway Health Health Information Professionals support our mission.
HIM
The Health Information Management (HIM) team is responsible for processing medical records requests for incoming and outgoing records, scanning and indexing documents into the electronic health records (EHR), and sorting e-faxes for the majority of the providers at Fenway. The HIM team receives an average of 700 requests a month incoming and outgoing medical records; last month, the team scanned and indexed a total of 7,000 documents.
The Fenway Health HIM team includes:
- Alyssa Paul, HIM Specialist II
- Maria Figueroa-Jackson, HIM Specialist I
- Anna Delegas, HIM Specialist I
- Heather Cleary, HIM Specialist I
- Jill Manca, HIM Specialist I
- Ashley Warner, HIM Specialist I
- Lakya Finklea, Temporary Clinical Data entry
Clinical Applications
Our Clinical Applications team evaluates, tests, selects, and implements the software systems we use every day to manage patient data and schedule clinical appointments. These systems have allowed us to already book over 6,000 patient appointments online in 2021. This year, our electronic reported outcome surveys were programmed by the team to text patients before their visits, resulting in an increase in completion of these important patient information surveys during both telehealth and in-person visits.
The Fenway Health Clinical Applications team includes:
- Emily Yunkun, Clinical Applications Manager
- Nia McDonald, Clinical Informatics Analyst II
- Corinne Fournier, Clinical Informatics Analyst I
- Franki Sturgess, Clinical Informatics Analyst I
- Heather Kho, Patient Tech Support Specialist
Data Analytics
The Data Analytics team processes, reviews, and analyzes our clinical data to identify opportunities for improving the Fenway Health patient experience. The team processed nearly 1,000 data requests in 2020, roughly a 30% increase from 2019. They have already processed over 400 requests for data in 2021. Over the past year, Data Analytics rapidly developed and operationalized a COVID Dashboard to track COVID-19 cases at Fenway Health, as well as an Operations Dashboard to track departmental visit volume as we shifted to many more telehealth visits. The team also began testing a Health Equity Index that incorporates Race, Ethnicity, and SOGI data to better understand ways to improve health equity outcomes across our diverse patient populations. The work of the Data Analytics team has helped inform the direction of our Health Equity Task Force and equitable outreach strategy for COVID-19 vaccines.
The Fenway Health Data Analytics team includes:
- Danielle Funk, Health Informatics Manager
- Ken Levine, Sr. Programmer/Analyst
- Dana King, Programmer/Analyst
- Juwan Campbell, Jr. Programmer/Analyst
- Anthony Yakely, Clinical Data Specialist
- Saumya Sankhavaram, Clinical Data Specialist
- Corey Covell, Clinical Data Specialist
- Sy Gitin, Clinical Data Specialist
- Asia Brice, Data and Evaluation Manager
- Nayrobi Mosquera, Public Health Data Specialist
- Marlene Cerritos-Rivas, Public Health Data Specialist
- Anthony Black, SDOH Data Specialist
Telehealth
In response to the COIVD pandemic, Fenway rapidly pivoted clinical services to telemedicine. Fenway Over the last 14 months, we have incorporated our telehealth strategy to both align and compliment the organization’s mission and strategic goals. Earlier this year, we were selected site to participate in C3’s Telehealth Transformation Initiative (TTI), which is a 12-month pilot project – areas of focus include remote patient monitoring, increasing screening rates and engagement of the care team.
The Telehealth team includes:
- Emily Phillips, Telehealth Project Manager
Chris Grasso is our Associate Vice President for Informatics and Data Services.
We’d like to thank all our Health Information Professionals for the essential work they do every day for Fenway Health.