Health information exchange organizations are facing the same problems recruiting qualified health IT personnel as are health IT departments in provider organizations, according to a recent staffing survey.
Competitive pay is an issue. So is competition for staff by other healthcare organizations. And of course, finding someone with the right combination of esoteric skills—experience in healthcare, IT and health information exchange—is a challenge, survey respondents said.
The online survey, conducted in May by the Chicago-based Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society and the American Health Information Management Association, queried representatives of 16 exchange organizations.
More than two-thirds of respondents were handling more than 1 million patients' records. Their total staff sizes ranged from 1.5 to 47 full-time-equivalent employees, with IT staffs ranging from 0 to 19 FTEs, according to the 30-page survey report.
The survey focused on IT staff positions, dividing them into three categories—workers in connectivity, data integrity and data integration. The surveyors found considerable overlap in those duties.
Salaries and experience levels were highest among the largest group, connectivity workers, whose titles included application architect, database administrator and health information exchange integration manager. They reported a pay range of $79,000 to $120,000, with 78% having a bachelor's degree and 22% a master's degree with computer science specified as a preferred course of study.
Data for the other two categories were impacted by the small sample size, with comparatively few survey participants whose organizations had jobs exclusively in that category. Only four of the 16 exchange organizations responded to specific questions about data integrity and just one on data integration.
Three of the four respondents for data integrity—titles included data analyst, healthcare database administrator and health information exchange implementation manager—indicated salaries for those positions were below $75,000 while a fourth was in the range of $90,000 to $119,000. Educational levels for data integrity positions ranged from high school to master's degree with general IT experience ranging from two to five years.
The one data integration worker reported having the title of interface engineer, with a pay range of $75,000 to $90,000 and a bachelor's degree “with an emphasis in JavaScript.” The one responding organization indicated its data integration position required 10 years of IT experience, including five years in health IT.
The relatively low pay offered to health IT workers compared with pay levels for IT workers in other industries has long been seen as a hiring challenge by healthcare recruiters. Last year, according to a survey of more than 100 healthcare organizations by Towers Watson, two-thirds reported having health IT recruiting troubles, with pay a factor in the eyes of workers.
Exchange leaders in this survey were no exception.
Overall, health information exchange organization respondents complained of “extended periods of time needed to find qualified candidates that both have a cultural and technical fit to the organization.”
Being unable to offer a competitive salary and benefits package, particularly in areas with a high cost of living, were frequently cited as challenges to filling open positions, as were finding people with the right combination of skills and industry competition for qualified candidates.
Follow Joseph Conn on Twitter: @MHJConn
