Department Overviews

Health Information Management

Department Director:  Julie Swavely
HIM Supervisor:  Nancy Bourgeois
Coding Supervisor:  Dawn Thoune

  • Health Information Management (HIM) is responsible for providing health records to the different departments, coding inpatient and outpatient visits for reimbursement from their insurance carriers, and releasing PHI.
  • The department continuously meets all relevant JCAHO standards including the turn around times for chart completion.  At the last JCAHO survey there were no medical record deficiencies and the department was found to have an acceptable delinquency rate.
  • There are 38 employees in HIM.  The staff consists of a Director, a Coding Supervisor, an HIM Supervisor, an HIM Administrator, several Health Information Technicians, Transcriptionists, Coder/Analyzers, Release of Information and File Clerks. 
  • The department has a low turnover rate and has several long-term employees.  HIM is known within the organization of possessing an excellent team-centered environment.
  • There are 12 Transcriptionists in the department; 8 work from home.
  • Physicians dictate into a Dictaphone system, the records are transcribed in SHAMS, and then the information is uploaded into Meditech (Magic). 
  • The annual operating budget for HIM is $1,586,911.
  • The HIM department consistently attends to patients’ and other hospitals’ needs on a timely basis.  The staff is challenged to perform their roles accurately while keeping up with current trends and regulations.
  • Within the upcoming year, HIM will continue performing their roles at a high-quality level while making positive first impressions and maintaining a professional appearance.
  • The department is working towards electronic patient records and hopes to have this in place in 2009. 
  • The HIM department at BAMC is unique in that patients report directly to the department to access their records whereas at many other hospitals patients are not allowed in HIM.
  • The HIM department has a division specifically dedicated to coding that uses 3M coding software.  When there is an overflow of work, however, BAMC electronically scans the health information files and sends them to a remote coding company who in return codes the information for BAMC.  The objective is to eliminate the need for outsourcing of coding functions.
  • The department prides itself in its employees; no matter how busy HIM gets everybody volunteers to help out where and when needed in order to get the job done.

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