Almost every day, a common question is posed to Philip R.O. Payne, PhD, FACMI, FAMIA, FIAHSI, FAIMBE:
Should I be worried about my job because of artificial intelligence (AI) and how it will impact the way I work?
“The first thing I say is it is going to change everything we do, but I don't think it's going to change the environment in the way that people imagine,” says Payne, Chief Health AI Officer at BJC Healthcare and WashU Medicine in St. Louis. “We know that the workload exceeds the hours and days in the week, so then it’s really a question of how we augment those human efforts with AI.”
Leading Data-Driven Initiatives
Payne will discuss moving AI from pilot to deployment and what that means for health information (HI) on Aug. 28 during the AHIMA Virtual Health Data & Informatics Summit—the first summit of its kind presented by AHIMA.
The one-day, virtual summit will explore the skills, strategies, and technologies that shape how healthcare organizations manage and use data, from AI validation and governance to data usability, interoperability, and patient identity matching. Attendees will gain practical, actionable insights to strengthen their informatics foundation and confidently lead data-driven initiatives. Attendees will receive 6 CEUs for participating in the live event, along with access to the on-demand recording. Registration is available online.
Six sessions will be offered at the summit:
- Expanding the Foundation: Owning Your Role in a Data-Driven World
- AI & Clinical Informatics: What HI Professionals Need to Know
- The Intelligent Health System: From AI Research to Enterprise Transformation
- Data Usability: The Last Mile of Healthcare Data
- Patient Identity & Record Matching: A Seven-Standard Framework
- Health Informatics in Action: Real-World Data, Interoperability & the Future of HI
“This summit focuses on that opportunity to address the gaps in skill sets, gaps in development, and gaps in knowledge base,” says Maria Caban Alizondo, PhD, MOL, RHIT, FAHIMA, Director of Health Informatics & Information Management Services at UCLA Health in Los Angeles. “Information management professionals are informatics professionals. What I focus on in my presentation is let's identify some opportunities to improve our skill sets here so that we can articulate clearly to our organizations, to patients, to our teams, where informatics professionals exist in the healthcare ecosystem and what it is that we're experts in doing.”
Learning More about Informatics for Your Career
Alizondo’s presentation, “Expanding the Foundation: Owning Your Role in a Data-Driven World,” will explore the intersection of data literacy, information governance, and cross-setting data flows, and look at today’s informatics roles in the workforce. She says the session will help expand attendees’ understanding of effective HI practice and address what hiring managers are seeking in job candidates.
“We walk through some great ways of rethinking how we do our work within an informatics space—working with data, asking questions, being analytical, and going back to source data to ensure verification validity,” says Alizondo, past president of AHIMA.
Alizondo encourages HI professionals to pursue educational and training opportunities to help them learn more about informatics, whether through conferences, professional communities, or continuing education resources like AHIMA's offerings.
“There are opportunities to find ways to lean into the essential skills that an informatics professional needs to know and does to increase our professional practice,” Alizondo says.
AHIMA’s website boasts a health informatics and data analytics section that provides trusted and vetted information on informatics, related career choices, training, and resources. AHIMA also offers the Foundations of Health Informatics (FHI) microcredential for individuals who can apply health informatics foundational knowledge across the fields of data management, data reporting, health data privacy, and project management.
“There’s a quick assessment you can take to see where you are, and it’s another way to create this self-confidence that we’re doing the right thing and we’re in the right space,” Alizondo says. “I have taken other microcredentials, and they're wonderful ways to help us think about what we know, how we apply it, and what we can do in those specific areas.”
In addition, on Oct. 4 during AHIMA26 in San Antonio, the workshop Data Analytics & Informatics Leadership for Health Information Professionals will be offered to show conference attendees how to drive change, strengthen data integrity, and influence outcomes.
Putting AI into Practice
In his summit presentation, “The Intelligent Health System: From AI Research to Enterprise Transformation,” Payne will discuss how implementing AI at health systems takes more than technical expertise. It requires governance, data integrity, and dedicated HI professionals to make HI work effectively in healthcare.
How well are healthcare organizations integrating AI with health information?
“It's one of those situations where the enthusiasm and the momentum is, without a doubt, growing at a rate that’s not commensurate with people's understanding of how to get value out of these tools,” says Payne, Vice Chancellor for Biomedical Informatics and Data Science at WashU Medicine. “Somewhere between 80 to 90 percent of AI projects fail to deliver any measurable value in healthcare systems today. And the reason is because we're deploying AI with this perception that we must deploy AI, that AI is this sort of critical enabler that we have to accelerate the adoption of. And we're employing it without understanding the environment in which we're employing it.”
AI alone doesn’t generate results. It's AI plus process and workflow re-engineering, change management, and workforce development in concert that provide value to health systems, Payne says.
As AI continues to play an increasing role in health systems, Payne encourages HI professionals to be part of the conversation around adopting AI and work together on solutions with clinical, operational, and safety leaders.
“A lot of people in our field believe that unless you have deep, technical expertise in AI, you can't be in a position to lead AI. That could not be farther from the truth,” he says. “It's relatively straightforward to find engineers and data scientists that understand these technologies. Where we don't have the workforce are the people that know how to map those technologies to real-world problems. Everyone working in our domain needs to lean into the idea that they are going to be leaders in terms of digital transformation of healthcare and that we are not deferring to people who build the technology to tell us how and where to use it.”
Payne says the summit is a great place for HI professionals to learn more about the role of AI in healthcare and how it will impact the work they do.
“Whether it's virtually or in person, these types of conferences, summits, and workshops are where knowledge exchange happens,” he says. “So, this is a unique opportunity with a cross-section of experts and practitioners in the field all coming together to share what's working and talk about practical lessons to learn.”
Rana Abuzir, RHIT, FACHDM, is director of health Information practice advancement at AHIMA. Damon Adams is content production editor at AHIMA.
By Rana Abuzir, RHIT, FACHDM, and Damon Adams