Year 2000 Contingency Planning Seminar Under Way
More than 100 people are attending an all-day seminar on year 2000 risk management and contingency planning on Thursday, Feb. 25. The seminar is part of an ongoing series to share year 2000 information within the health-care sector. The session will be held at the Colchester Regional Hospital auditorium, 207 Willow St., in Truro.
"These seminars are an important part of our co-ordinated effort to address potential problems with critical equipment and systems before the end of the year," said Amanda Whitewood, chair of the Information Technology Working Group and vice-president of corporate services at The Nova Scotia Hospital. "The seminars bring together a wide variety of professional staff from health-care organizations across Nova Scotia to make sure that we're all working together and taking the right steps to resolving our year 2000 issues."
The working group is a committee of senior administrators and information technology directors from all regional health boards, the Department of Health and non-designated organizations such as the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, IWK Grace, Cape Breton Health Care Complex and The Nova Scotia Hospital.
The seminar will focus on how health care organizations in Nova Scotia and other jurisdictions, including the Calgary Health Authority and the Toronto Hospital, are identifying risks and developing contingency plans in preparation for year 2000. Presentations on legal and insurance issues will be made, as well.
"Individual health care organizations and the ITWG have been working to address the year 2000 challenge since spring 1997," said Amanda Whitewood. "Our goal is to minimize any disruption to patients on Jan. 1, 2000."
Although each member organization is responsible for managing their own year 2000 efforts, the working group established a Project Co-ordination Office in 1998 to support the member organizations, provide a vehicle for sharing information, minimize duplication, and communicate year 2000 readiness status to Nova Scotians.
This is the sixth seminar in a series of educational opportunities hosted by the working group.
HEALTH--BACKGROUNDER: Year 2000 Contingency Planning
WHAT IS BEING DONE IN NOVA SCOTIA TO SOLVE YEAR 2000 PROBLEMS IN
THE HEALTH CARE SYSTEM?
Today, organizations world-wide are working to solve the looming, potential problems presented by the year 2000. Members of the Nova Scotia Provincial Health System are no exception. Since June 1997, the Health Information Technology Working Group has been working to co-ordinate a provincewide response to ensure electronic devices are year 2000 compliant. The Department of Health, the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, the Cape Breton Regional Health Care Complex, The Nova Scotia Hospital, the IWK Grace Health Centre, and the Eastern, Western, Central and Northern Regional Health Boards have joined forces to minimize duplication in identifying and resolving year 2000 problems.
Each of the four regional health boards, the four non-designated organizations and the Department of Health are accountable for resolving their own year 2000 issues. They have agreed to establish and maintain their own project office to assess, fix and test year 2000 compliance within their individual facilities.
The Department of Health and the working group have set up a Project Co-ordination Office to support their efforts. The office supports the important work of these organizations by acting as an advisory body and a resource to assist in looking at opportunities for co-ordinated testing, utilization of the costing model, providing information seminars and reporting progress to Health's many stakeholders.
The set-up of the Project Co-ordination Office has been awarded to Eastbridge Consulting Inc. of Halifax. Eastbridge Consulting is an information technology professional services firm. One of the company's strengths is its project management depth. They will employ project management methods and techniques to set up the office with the aim of improving co-ordination and reporting, facilitating the sharing of year 2000 project information between health care organizations and reducing duplication of effort.
Because of the tremendous amount of work that needs to be done, members of the Information Technology Working Group have agreed to focus on upgrading clinical systems and equipment first. In addition, as part of the year 2000 Compliance Action Plan, each health care organization's project office will develop contingencies for managing lower priority systems and equipment.
Although the last day of December is rapidly approaching, a comprehensive action plan has been developed and working group members are actively implementing the steps outlined. Progress reports from the nine-member organization are provided to the working group on a regular basis to facilitate accurate and thorough communications and will available in March 1999 through the working group's new homepage.