Beyond IT: The Expanding Purview Of CIOs

We are seeing the CIO’s role and responsibilities expand as new clinical systems and enterprise technologies are implemented across hospitals and health systems. How many of you have expanded your responsibilities outside of the IT department in the last few years? The three main areas besides telecommunication that are being added to the CIO’s scope of responsibilities include:

• Medical/clinical informatics
• Health information management
• Biomedical/clinical engineering

The supporting data

According to the 24th Annual HIMSS Leadership Survey (sponsored by Infor), 92 percent of senior IT executives have other areas of responsibilities outside of the IT department, the most common being:

• Telecommunications — 75 percent
• Medical/clinical informatics — 51 percent
• Health information management — 26 percent
• Biomedical/clinical engineering — 18 percent

Based on CIO survey data that I assessed from 2007 to 2011, only 22 percent of the CIO respondents had HIM responsibility in 2007, while 32 percent did in 2011.  In 2007, 19 percent of CIOs had biomedical engineering, compared with 37 percent in 2011.

Why the change?

The implementation of electronic medical records and the goal of integration across the health system has increased the need for IT leadership over these departments. Medical/clinical informaticists are the vital bridge between IT and the clinical areas being automated. The automation of the medical record has changed the way the HIM department operates and the director, in many cases, seems to prefer reporting to the CIO. The monitoring equipment run by biomedical engineers is now part of computer systems that integrate to the electronic medical record. In fact, there are quite a number of directors of biomedical engineering that have become health system CIOs.

What has been your experience? What other areas or departments now report up to you?