Welcome to the Becker's healthcare podcast. I'm Molly
Gamble with Becker's. And today, I'm joined by
Vina Lingam, associate chief medical information officer at
Moffett Cancer Center in Tampa, Florida.
Vina, hello and welcome. Thank you so much
for joining me as my guest today.
Thank you, Molly. Thank you so much for
having me, and I'm really excited to be
here.
Yeah. Well, I I thought we could start,
Vina, if you can bring us a little
closer to your work at Moffitt Cancer Center.
I understand
you've been in this role for about a
month's time.
You're settling in.
What have you been spending most of your
time and energy on as of late as
you're adjusting to your new role?
This is my first major career
change or move. So I'm really spending a
lot of time
getting to know the organization,
the culture,
the layout and the hierarchy.
What are the priorities?
In my past position,
I was at Stony Brook Medicine for 15
years and
kind of grew along with the organization
and its informatics journey.
This is a very
different,
perspective I'm gaining here by being the outsider
coming in
and learning,
a new organization.
Mhmm.
That's a really important perspective. You know, there's
advantages to being part of a program since
its beginning like you were at Stony Brook
Medicine for 15 years. I mean, that's a
big stretch of time and to grow up,
like you said, or grow along with the
organization
in its informatics journey, but also
to be an outsider coming in,
have you detected or what what can you
tell us about some of the priorities that
Moffett has in place for its analytics or
the chief medical information
program.
Anything that you've learned that our listeners might
find interesting?
What I'm really seeing is a
a kind of big
push and
prioritization
of investment
in informatics.
And when I say that, I don't just
mean,
investing in
solutions or vendors and, you know, software.
It's also
a a big push to invest in informatics
personnel,
both at leadership level as well as in
their,
at all levels of their informatics
team, as I can see, as I get
to know all the layers of the depart
of the Department of Clinical Informatics as it
exists here at Moffett.
Really, that that's a
big positive that I see.
It takes
informatics
professionals,
that have
kind of spent time learning these principles to
be able to get the most out of
all these solutions that we buy in order
to make our health care systems more
efficient and effective
in delivering care for our patients.
So that investment,
it is something that I find promising.
Mhmm.
Yeah. And Another thing I really noticed is
everything is about the patient experience. These it's
a cancer center, which is
very different from my prior experience, again, coming
from a general,
you know, all specialty
academic center to a
large organization
very much focused on
delivering,
you know, the best cancer care. And these
are patients that are coming in at a
very low point in their life or after
having received,
you know,
not the best news. So,
I think
having all of that sorted out and really
centering all the workflows and everything around the
patient experience and having giving them the smoothest
journey possible seems to be a priority, and
I I'm really appreciating that here.
Mhmm.
Well, that's terrific. I mean, it sounds like
when you talk about I so appreciate the
distinction. It's not just investing in, like you
said, software or vendors,
or solutions, but in talent itself at all
layers of the organization.
That's that's really substantial.
Veena, I know it's early days for you
at Moffett, but looking ahead to 2025,
is there anything you can tell us about
some big organizational goals that you're setting out
to accomplish with your team?
Yes. So my a big part of my
role and my recruitment has been to
set up and actually recruit and build the
clinical informatics fellowship program here at Moffett. It's
a,
fellowship program for physicians,
who have completed their residency training, might be
early or late. It's a USF program at
Moffett Cancer Center.
And
my main priority and and top goal here
is to,
set up and, you know, build and
set up this, program successfully.
And, again, goes towards the mission of really
training that talent.
The informatics personnel
are the
key ingredients, let's say, to building that learning
health system that we're all trying to be.
I wanted to ask about that because when
you said that earlier about investing in talent,
I I was thinking to myself, I'm so
well versed and aware of the various personnel
shortages that health systems face, whether it's from
technicians,
to
nurses and physicians and specialists of all different
types.
But when it comes to medical or clinical
informatics
professionals,
what what type of talent pipeline are you
working with, Feena? Is it constricted, or is
it
ample? Do do you feel like there's sufficient
resources there? Is there scarcity? Can you can
you tell us more about
what the
supply looks like for that type of professional
or personnel in your organization?
So from what I can see at the
organization
so far, there's been there's a robust team.
They're recruiting really talented people, but I,
the recruitment
has not been that easy. It is hard
to find,
experienced or well trained informatics personnel and it
goes. It's more of it's
both the supply and demand shortage.
Informatics,
clinical informatics is not a straightforward career.
Most residents and, you know, applicants that I've
ever spoken to
kind of say, well, I just found out
because I randomly met the CMIO at our
organization
and realized this is an actual profession. I
could use my medical knowledge and clinical experience
in different ways
to help the health care system,
not just by, you know, going out to
see patients or do special, you know, specialty
fellowships, etcetera.
So it has been
challenging
to kind of build the clinical informatics workforce.
One is really because employers
either do not recognize the need to invest
in personal, as I mentioned before,
as much as they invest in the software.
And
2, they don't understand what kind of or
they're not yet so familiar
with
what kind of skills and
knowledge and expertise clinical informaticians
bring to the table and how they could
really help them realize the value,
of all the products that they have.
So because the employers
or the job opportunities as are not as
clear cut, it kind of serves as a
disincentive
for potential
future informaticians
from kind of choosing this, career path that
there's a lot of uncertainty. It's not as
clear cut if I go and do,
a gastroenterology
fellowship after
internal medicine, I know my lifestyle. I know,
you know, what my salary would be. I
know what I would be doing. Informatics has
so many possible trajectories, and it kind of
seems like, you know, the path less traveled
and not as not as laid out. So
that serves as a disincentive. So in both
ways, I think there's not as many job
opportunities
posted in general,
and there's not as many people choosing to
go into
this career path
due to the, you
know, lack of
a clear kind of trajectory that they could
see for themselves.
I see. That makes sense. It's it's almost
like it's health care's best kept secret in
a way. Maybe it's a less established career
path or an org chart like you said,
but it sounds like just really ample opportunity.
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I started off I
mean, I call myself a generalist at heart
in residency. I kind of liked every aspect
of medicine, but nothing enough to really say
this is my passion. I want to go,
you know, do oncology or whatever for the
rest of my life. I wanted to stay
that generalist, but,
it is
if you have that system,
vision and high level kind of problem solving
kind of mentality,
informatics really gave me that opportunity
to have a say to play a role
in making things better for both patients and
our clinicians in the system.
So that really gives me
even more fulfillment
than
having just, you know, been the hospitalist and
worked really hard.
So I am
really
I do think it's the best kept secret,
and I wanted to not be a secret
anymore and really attract these,
you know,
people in the clinical trend as soon see
the problems, who understand the problems, and who
have the problem solving mentality,
and process improvement mentality to
come into the field and and make
every the system better.
Absolutely. I mean, I I can't imagine a
time,
more than now, especially with some of the
question marks around AI and generative AI,
where this role is so important. You know,
it's not like it's some pocket of the
organization that's
an ancillary or nice to have. I mean,
for health systems, this is a a really
important role,
that needs experienced talent, strong leaders,
good critical thinkers, like you said. And also,
I I respect and appreciate your comment about
the generalist, you know, going
a mile wide and inch deep,
versus vice versa,
can be so helpful
in the informatics program given how many professionals
it touches. Right?
So so, Zavina, I you're about a month
in at Moffett. You mentioned you were with
Stony Brook Medicine for 14 years,
a really impressive stretch of time with that
organization.
Let's talk about you a little bit and
and your leadership.
How have you been evolving or sharpening
or trying to kind of level yourself up
with this new chapter of your career?
And how have you been
making yourself at home now at Moffett? Any
advice that you would share with other leaders
who are looking to make a similar change
like you after spending such a significant portion
of time of their career with 1 organization?
Yeah. I think one,
thing is I'm learning. I'm glad,
that I
took the leap. It was definitely a leap
getting out of the comfort zone.
We're coming from a system like we you
know how everything works to an entirely new
system and and way of doing things.
I am
trying to think
bigger,
or a high level picture, trying to understand
what
is driving a majority of the decisions at
this organization
and taking things slow, really trying to learn
in the 1st few months
rather than just, you know, come in and
do.
Also, another big career change,
I guess, advice or lesson learned
is
it's definitely
an opportunity
to,
as you said, level up and kind of
reinvent
myself.
The 15 years at Stony Brook, I started
off as an intern.
So pretty, you know, low on the totem
pole, very narrow thinking of just my patient,
you know, my medical knowledge.
And along the way, with you know, great
mentorship and opportunities, I was able to
develop
the leadership
mentality. So what I'm really trying to do
is own that and start off at that
level and then build upon it.
There I have great leaders here,
that I consider mentors at Moffett,
who played a big role in me choosing
to come here,
the CMIO, doctor Perkins. I'm really trying to
learn again, use this opportunity to
level up, grow, learn and build upon
my skills.
So things like process improvement,
learning the technology
or learning, you know, large language models or
at least how they work.
That's,
you know, kind of more granular.
But at a high level, I'm trying to
also fill up the gaps where I may
not have learned so much all along, like
the finances of health care
or other, you know, kind of leadership strategies
at a larger level.
Mhmm. Well, it sounds like you're off to
a terrific start. I I think, as as
you described it, to take things slow and
to to really learn and have things stick
versus to come in and and do right
away as you put it. Sounds sometimes
easy in theory. I know that's a lot
of work itself, though, to be observant,
to make connections, to, like you said, try
to better understand what's driving the majority of
the decisions made at Moffett.
So, Vina, it sounds like you have,
made yourself at home, but still have been
taking a really strategic approach
to your transition.
Wanna just wish you continued success in that,
and, hopefully, we can catch up again
soon when you're a few months to a
year end and see how things have been
going for you.
Yeah. I'd love to. And hopefully, by that
time, I'll be,
you know, after the races with our fellowship
as well. Yeah. Oh, yes. Yes. We'll check-in
on that as well.
Well, Vina Lingam, I I just wanna thank
you again for being my guest today. Listeners,
Vina is the associate chief medical information officer
with Moffett Cancer Center in Tampa. Vina, thank
you so much again for being my guest.
Thank you, mom,
for having