Health library

Medical informatics (MI) combines the age-old science of medicine with the new-age science of information technology (IT). With roots in the earliest electronic health records (EHR) of the 1960s, MI today is an evolving and well-respected subspecialty within the field of medicine. Its rapid growth has been fueled by the same explosion of information technology that has become accepted and expected in many other areas of our daily lives.

Michael Hetrick, MD, who recently retired from a long and successful pediatric practice, has embraced a second career as the Chief Medical Informatics Officer (CMIO) for Grande Ronde Hospital (GRH).

The CMIO role has been around for a couple of decades, he says, but is evolving as data-driven technology becomes increasingly important to the practice of medicine. Dr. Hetrick sees new opportunities for CMIOs as health care and technology advance into new territories. One that he is particularly interested in is precision medicine and its benefit to patients.

“Breakthroughs in genetic predictors that tailor treatment options specifically for the individual patient are only achievable­—only as good—as the data we have to work with. Medicine is the last great enterprise we are trying to quantify and improve with technologies that we are already applying everywhere else. These new frontiers show us just how unimaginable it is to foresee how blending medicine with IT will impact the way we practice medicine and treat disease,” he says.

This fall, GRH transitions 21 different computer systems into one integrated system in a changeover to the EPIC platform. As CMIO, Dr. Hetrick plays a pivotal role in the most complicated and massive IT project GRH has ever undertaken. “It had become increasingly clear to hospital and clinic providers that—as our computer system had grown, and the accompanying demands for improved and expanded functionality were a regular occurrence—a state-of-the-art upgrade to allow everything to seamlessly work together, especially the EHR, was a priority,” he explains.

Dr. Hetrick has the “street cred” needed to mesh the project demands with the daily realities of medical providers. Although providers understand the need for the upgrade, they sometimes view the documentation and data gathering required as getting in the way of patient care. It can be frustrating. Both his experience in patient care and easygoing approach help “modulate the conversation,” he says, between technology and medicine as needed.

He matter-of-factly acknowledges that the current EPIC transition is disruptive and that there will be additional frustrations with so many changes on the horizon. However his enthusiasm for the future of health care technology remains contagiously optimistic.

“I believe the level of the disruption we experience now is in direct correlation to the potential we have to create something great,” Dr. Hetrick says, “for our children and for the future.”

Learn more by searching for “EPIC” at grh.org.