By Nikisha Banks
CCC Journalism Program
BLACKWOOD – Camden County College is offering free programs to help prepare students for jobs in a growing industry.
Students majoring in the information technology and health information technology fields will have the opportunity to take courses on the Blackwood campus in the up and coming field of electronic health record systems. The courses are made possible through a 200-student grant under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, also known as the stimulus bill. Textbook costs will also be covered under the grant.
An estimated 50,000 job openings are projected to be available in the field in the near future and they have to be filled by at least 2014, which is the government deadline for all medical records to be converted to electronic format. Dana Clarke-Scott, program manager, can foresee even more benefits to the program.
“I see jobs spinning off of these three roles that we’re teaching. There’s a whole initiative once individual providers and healthcare facilities have their medical records electronic. The terminology ‘meaningful use’ has come out of that, meaning are you collecting the data and are you using it to benefit outcomes?” says the manager of two years. “For example, are we noticing trends that can impact public health? Is there say, a pocket of individuals that are showing up with the swine flu as a result of the information that’s been collected and reported. Collecting that information and being able to monitor trends is very important for public health, so I do see this being a benefit for trending diseases and different things and another possible job opportunity in collecting statistics.”
The program will focus on three job titles that fall under two categories. The first category of mobile adoption roles requires workers to implement the HER systems at specific locations and then move onto the next location. The job titles for this category are practice workflow and information management redesign specialist and implementation support specialist. The second category, permanent staff workers, is employees who provide ongoing support of EHR systems that have already been installed. The job title for this category is trainer.
A background in health care, IT or information management is required for the mobile adoption roles, and background experience as a health professional, health information management specialist or trainer is necessary for a permanent staff worker position. All three positions require potential candidates to have an associate’s or bachelor’s degree.
Classes are six months in length and can be completed either online or as a hybrid. Completion of the courses qualifies students for the national certification exam. If you don’t currently have the necessary experience, completion of the health information technology HIT program can provide the necessary training to qualify.
Information sessions will be held from 2 to 3 p.m. March 9 at the Camden County College Library conference room of the Wolverton Learning Resources Center. The next session of classes will begin April 4. For more information, go to http://www.camdencc.edu and click the Health Information Technology link or contact Dana Clarke-Scott at dclarkescott@camdencc.edu or (856) 227-2700, ext. 4356.