Community colleges will soon have the capacity and ability to educate much-needed health information technology (HIT) workers. With leadership from associate professor Dr. Patricia Abbott, the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing will develop a new informatics curriculum to be deployed to local colleges throughout the U.S.
In addition, faculty from nursing, medicine, and public health will collaborate to develop the JHU Health IT Workforce Training Program which will create post-baccalaureate HIT programs in all three schools. The School of Nursing plans an eight-month certificate program in Applied Health Informatics, where students will earn 13.5 academic credit hours that may be applied toward a master’s degree. The projects are funded with two grants—totaling more than $5.5 million—from the U.S. economic stimulus package (ARRA) Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act.