Scott Vachon, Director of IT, Littleton Regional Hospital, Chapter 1

Like any health IT leader, Scott Vachon has quite a few burners going, whether it’s leading his team through a major transition, crafting an effective cybersecurity strategy, or the ever-evolving quest to improve user experience. And although all of these areas are exciting, what he loves most about his role is “creating future leaders.” Vachon, who has had the opportunity to learn from industry icons like Liz Johnson and Tim Stettheimer, is giving back by offering his services to others in hopes of helping them to reach their goals.

In this interview, Vachon talks the key role leadership has played as Littleton Regional has become part of North Country HealthCare, how they’re working toward the goal of providing a “holistic community support system,” why he’ll never be satisfied when it comes to cybersecurity, and what he learned during his time with the US Marines.

Chapter 1



* About Littleton

* Becoming part of North Country HealthCare — “We’re going to be stronger together.”

* Leadership buy-in — “They’ve allowed us to invest in building our team.”

* Keys to a successful transition

* Shrinking the infrastructure & footprint

* Mobility for staff — “We want to offer simplicity.”

* “Defensive and offensive” approach to cybersecurity



LISTEN NOW USING THE PLAYER BELOW OR CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO OUR iTUNES PODCAST FEED

Bold Statements

We want to offer simplicity. Our goal is always to make sure that the computers and applications disappear into the background and patient care comes to the foreground.

How do we provide a better outcome and a better care delivery system for those patients that are more challenging to keep in the healthcare system? We’re seeing some success right now, and we believe analytics is going to give us greater success moving forward.

We look at it as a holistic community support delivery system. Whether it’s mental health services, recovery services, or traditional healthcare services, they’re all important to the outcomes of our community. And they’re important in terms of us being able to supplement each other and provide the services that any one organization might not be able to.

Our executive leadership sees this as an investment in the business, and an investment in the patients. Instead of looking at it as an expense that doesn’t really have a return, they see it as a definite insurance for patients, and for staff.

Gamble:  Hi Scott, thank you so much for taking some time to speak with healthsystemCIO.com.

Vachon:  It’s great to be here.

Gamble:  To get things started, can you talk about Littleton Regional — what you have in terms of hospital beds, clinics, and where you’re located?

Vachon:  Sure. We’re a 25-bed critical access hospital located in Northern New Hampshire. We have a handful of practices associated with us, and we work with a number of community partners. In addition to that, we’re part of a four-hospital healthcare organization called North Country HealthCare, which also includes a home health and hospice agency. We’re taking care of the population of Northern New Hampshire and some of the folks in Vermont as well.

Gamble:  As far as North Country HealthCare, it looks like that came together fairly recently?

Vachon:  Yes. I think we’re about three years into the affiliation, but the real work has begun in the last year or so, in terms of building the framework for how we’re going to move ahead together, setting out our initiatives, and figuring out how five organizations can work as one.

Gamble:  I imagine that’s not an easy feat. Can you talk about what that has entailed as far as getting different organizations together to build a framework?

Vachon:  The first part was to acknowledge that we’re going to be stronger together,