IT Professionals Day 2021: The Barnes IT Team

IT Professionals Day is a day dedicated to all things IT! This year, we're asking team members a few questions about their love for IT, the future of the department at Barnes, and their role in helping us transform healthcare. Stay tuned to hear from our IT Project Manager, Daniel Kreitz, and our Software Engineer, Dustin Cox.

What do you love about IT?

DK - When done correctly, IT has the potential to make work and life easier. It enables us to better understand information and data coming from the world around us. It enables us to do things faster, more efficiently, and with fewer errors. It allows us to share information and knowledge with more people rather than it being stored or locked away. And it enables us to connect to each other and information in ways that were not possible before.

DC - I like how much it has helped improve our lives and the teamwork. Most people never see the whole picture of what it takes to play an app on their phone or check their email 30,000 thousand feet in the air. It is a big team effort.

What does the future of IT look like at Barnes?

DK - I feel a lot of our systems will be moving online where we’ll be able to access information from a web browser or a mobile app on any device. Downtime from system updates will be minimal if not existent. We’ll be more connected to our patients and doctors. There will be less faxing and scanning. We will have access to more information about our patients. Not only will we have more vital data from our patients, but we’ll have a better understanding of their living conditions and environment. We will be able to engage with our patients in different ways like text messages and video calls. And our patients will have more control to manage their care and engage with us, including the ability to refill their prescriptions and reorder medical supplies.

DC - We are transforming healthcare. We want to provide the best care for our patients and one way to help our patients is the Apollo app. Apollo is great it cuts down on all the duplicate task that field tech see every day and we are adding more each day. We are giving our healthcare professionals tools that help them provide the best quality of care. We are also developing tools for the Barnes team that will help with process improvements.

How does your role in IT here at Barnes help us transform healthcare?

DK - My role as an IT project manager helps Barnes transform healthcare by ensuring the investments we make in people and technology are applied effectively and efficiently, that the projects we commit to align with the overall mission of our organization, and that those projects are completed successfully, meeting the objectives for which they were envisioned. Beyond that, I also feel that my role helps us transform healthcare by listening to everyone at any level in the organization. To understand where we are at today and where we want to be in the future, and to come up with strategies on ways that technology can help us get there.

DC - Before Barnes started the Apollo project, techs would have to log in to multiple systems and enter the same data repeatedly. The tools were not proficient and techs were stuck doing the same thing repeatedly. The Apollo app gives the techs what they need in one system. We have also developed ship notification systems for patient medications. This will email patients the tracking number for the medication so they can keep track of the status and delivery date. By freeing up time for the Barnes team this will help us find new ways to improve workflows and this will increase the quality of patient career.