UNMC’s Information Technology Services Department and Nebraska Medicine’s Department of Enterprise Technology Services will be combined in 2017 to create an integrated IT resource that will better serve the needs of the entire enterprise.
The move will affect 122 people at UNMC and 114 at Nebraska Medicine, and the combined department will report to Michael Ash, M.D., chief transformation officer for Nebraska Medicine and assistant professor, general internal medicine, UNMC.
“If you look at the combined needs of the enterprise, our academic, research and clinical missions all require shared information technology to be successful,” said Dr. Ash.
The specifics of the integration are currently under discussion, and an initial plan will be presented to UNMC Chancellor Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D., and the Information Management Governance Group on Jan. 18, said Brian Lancaster, executive director of information management at Nebraska Medicine. The tentative goal is to complete integration by July 1.
“There are unique aspects of the academic and research mission that we want to heighten with this integration, and there’s also shared services we really want to synergize and integrate,” Lancaster said. “With this collective IT department, we’ll have common processes and procedures across the shared technology, but we also want to have a heightened focus. How do we really support a faculty member who has an academic mission vs. a clinician who’s providing care? Or a student, or a researcher? We want to take time to understand it and come back with a meaningful plan.”
The move is not in response to the current state budget situation, said Deb Thomas, vice chancellor of business and finance at UNMC.
“This is not being done for a cost-saving initiative,” she said. “It’s to provide the highest level of service.”
The UNMC and Nebraska Medicine facilities departments recently integrated, and Lancaster said that the success of that effort can serve as a working model for the IT integration.
“The departments are coming together to leverage shared resources on a heightened level,” he said.
Employees will remain with their current employer, although there may be a period where UNMC employees can transition to Nebraska Medicine if they wish, Lancaster said.
“The first step is to establish a vision. Our vision collectively will be to provide technology that is a strategic asset to the enterprise. This is critical for us to deliver our shared mission statement to ‘lead the world in transforming lives to create a healthy future for all individuals and communities through premier educational programs, innovative research and extraordinary patient care,'” Lancaster said. “Ultimately, both ITS and ETS desire to provide the technology required for operations as well as drive innovation to enhance our educational programs, drive innovative research as well as provide the highest quality of patient care while being more efficient and collaborative across the enterprise.”