Graduate student first to earn Interprofessional Health Informatics Certificate

Max Golec is earning a master’s degree in health administration during Friday’s December 2020 graduate celebration, and he is also the first GVSU student to earn an Interprofessional Health Informatics Certificate. 

The newly offered certificate is designed to meet the growing informatics need within health care systems. 

Golec is an improvement coordinator in claims and administration at Priority Health. He said he is putting his MHA degree and certificate to work modeling data and reports for population health initiatives.

“I am receiving a master’s degree in health administration with a focus in finance, so the informatics certificate complements my degree,” he said. “I’ll have the financial piece and the data piece as well.”

Golec said informatics knowledge is in demand with major organizations looking to leverage informatics when it comes to social determinants of health, especially during the pandemic.

The certificate was developed and implemented by Raymond Higbea, director of the School of Public, Nonprofit, and Health Administration; Guenter Tusch, director of the Health Informatics and Bioinformatics Program; and Marie VanderKooi, assistant professor of nursing.

Higbea said emerging health information technology fields now extend beyond acute care to include population health informatics, data analytics and telehealth. 

“Over the past 20 years, the need in health care organizations for big data analytic skills has increased dramatically as a necessary support for population health, shared savings and value-based payment programs, and emergency management,” said Higbea. “Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, health care organizations around the country have used the analysis of informatics data to guide their preparation for and response to COVID-driven surges.”

Learn more about the Interprofessional Health Informatics Certificate.