Yuma Regional Medical Center

Randy has been in Yuma for three months now. He has decided it is time to tell you about his job here.

I arrived here in Yuma on April 7, got my company furnished apartment on April 8, and started working on Tuesday, April 13. This has been almost 3 months now. I am in a new group of about 41 people. There are three people with the same job title as mine – interface analyst. This is a change in my work. I have been analyzing as a part of programming for many years, but never just analyzing.

It has proved to be in an interesting three months. The project is to modernize the Yuma Regional Medical Center’s (YRMC) information system and replace it with system from Epic as well as an Electronic Health Record system that is the wave of the future as well as being required by the U.S. government.

I learned that over 2,000 people applied for the positions with YRMC and the Epic development. Of those 41 were hired with 18 of them coming from within YRMC. I was one of the fortunate few.

The first job was to study the current system set up and help with the current state assessments of the various hospital departments. The second was to prepare for an Interface Analyst class and certification test for the Epic software. If I was not able to pass the test, I would not be working on the project and possibly not employed by YRMC anymore.

My current job is as an Interface Analyst. It means that I help the various external computer systems of the hospital communicate with each other. They use a health care promoted protocol called HL7 that I worked with in Oregon to accomplish this. The various departments have equipment from various vendors.

I took the class at Epic in Wisconsin at the end of May. I took the certification test shortly thereafter. The other two members of my group and I passed the test on the first attempt. It was a wonderful feeling to have that done with.

The next step is training on the new interface software called Ensemble as we move from the previous software called Quovadx by Cloverleaf. We will need to bring the old system over to Ensemble and then get the new Epic software to work with it.

Last week, I was asked to take on another task that requires I get certified on the Epic “Data Courier” software. I will be taking that class on August 2 and 3. I will also must take and pass a certification test.

YRMC is one of the major employers in the area and probably the best to work for. I consider myself very fortunately to be here and I have great people to work with. I am also glad to be "back home" in Arizona – the land of marvelous sunsets, desert sands, hot summers, and mild winters.

Editor's note: If the details of Randy's job do not make any sense to you, ask him to explain them to you.