J.D. Whitlock, CIO, Dayton Children’s Hospital, Chapter 1

When J.D. Whitlock started at Dayton Children’s Hospital back in January, it may have been his first CIO role, but he’s no stranger to healthcare IT — or to leadership roles. And so he expected to face challenges, especially with an organization that’s restructuring to lay the foundation for growth. But he also realized the enormous opportunity it presented to help determine the right strategy going forward.

In this interview, Whitlock discusses the many priorities on his plate, including planning for both an Epic upgrade and infrastructure refresh, and putting the analytics building blocks into place to support population health. He also talks about why he’s happy to engage with clinical leaders when it comes to EHR functionality, how he’s dealing with gaps in cybersecurity knowledge, and the many ways in which he has benefited from his experiences with Mercy Health as well as the U.S. Air Force.

Chapter 1



* Dayton Children’s (170-bed freestanding hospital)

* Reorg focused on improving governance

* Telehealth: “We’re exploring different use cases.”

* Upgrading to Epic 2018

* “It doesn’t make sense to invest and not take advantage of everything it offers.”

* New features & functions – “It’s like eye candy to clinical leadership.”

* Building dashboards with Workfront



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Bold Statements

We’ve recognized the problems it has caused in the past and we’re trying to rectify those, because there’s so much great functionality available. It doesn’t make sense to make the big investment in Epic, and then not take advantage of it.

It’s stepping through all the new functionality and what are things we can easily to take advantage of that we’ll get as part of 2018, versus other things that would require a build and plugging into our governance efforts.

As with all things governance, you need to make sure you have the right people make decisions at the right level of granularity with what you’re doing.

We’re building dashboards within that tool to manage it so that when we get together with our customers, we can efficiently rack and stack, prioritize, and give visibility to all the work that’s going on for our application coordinators who are doing their build.

Gamble:  Hi J.D., thank you so much for taking some time to speak with us today. I think the best place to start is with some information about Dayton Children’s Hospital — what you have in terms of bed size, where you’re located, things like that.

Whitlock:  Sure. We’re located in Dayton, Ohio. We have a 170-bed hospital, with about 130 employed physicians. There’s one main campus, and a south campus with ambulatory, surgery, and an emergency department, and then outlying campuses with some urgent care and imaging and other ancillaries.

 

Gamble:  And it’s a freestanding hospital, correct?

Whitlock:  Yes. We have a large rural service area to the north of us, and then to the south of us is one big suburb between Dayton and Cincinnati. We’re in the same general neck of the woods as two topped ranked children’s hospital, Cincinnati Children’s and Nationwide Children’s in Columbus, and so we both collaborate and compete with them.

 

Gamble:  Interesting. That’s something we’re starting to see more of across the country as far as collaborating while competing. And you’ve been with the organization since January?

Whitlock:  Yes.

 

Gamble:  Okay. I wanted to get some of your thoughts on those first few months and how you approached the role in terms of getting to know the organization and staff, and starting to prioritize tasks.

Whitlock:  The way we’re structured, I have a staff of about 100.