ECU, community colleges partner to transform health information careers

An innovative partnership between the baccalaureate health information management program at East Carolina University’s College of Allied Health Sciences — and nearly a dozen community colleges across the state — promises to change the face of health care and the lives of the program’s graduates.

Background

An associate degree in health information technology can currently be completed at 11 community colleges across North Carolina. The HIT certification, which comes after successfully completing accredited coursework, allows graduates to work in medical billing and coding, health information records and other data-intense parts of the state’s health care infrastructure.

Dr. Susie Harris is a professor of health information management and director of the College of Allied Health Science’s health information management program.

The four-year degree in health information management, a natural extension from the HIT certification, puts graduates in more managerial roles, overseeing teams of HIT-qualified employees. ECU has one of 68 HIM programs in the country and is the only program in North Carolina accredited by the profession’s credentialing body, the Commission on Accreditation of Health Informatics and Information Management Education.

The two programs fit hand-in-glove, which ECU’s Dr. Susie Harris, a professor and director of the College of Allied Health Science’s health information management program, likens to the educational progression from a licensed practical nurse to a registered nurse.

The first bilateral agreement between ECU and Pitt Community College was signed in 2018, streamlining the process of accepting courses from a prospective student’s community college program.

“We aimed to create a seamless pathway for HIT students to earn their four-year degree, enabling them to sit for their RHIA (Registered Health Information Administrator) credentialing exam and strengthening their readiness for the health information workforce,” Harris said. “This degree qualifies graduates for higher level jobs with better pay and more opportunities. The RHIA credential is one of the most sought-after credentials in the health care industry.”

Ashleigh Walker, PCC’s program director, said she has students from across the state due to the quality of the program and its connection to ECU. She said once students get into the program they are surprised by the range of opportunities available to them after graduation.

Walker, who sometimes teaches at ECU, said the range of students she has is a result of the flexibility of the online program — second degree and adult learners without any medical knowledge as well as established nurses and medical assistants.

“They’re here for a reason. They have a family to support and see the job opportunities that are out there,” Walker said.

Health care, Walker said, is increasingly an information business, and her graduates are expertly trained to help shepherd health care businesses through the radical shift in the information space.

“You can collect all the data you want and store it in a warehouse, but unless you can extract meaningful insights from it, that data has no real value,” Walker said.

ECU accepts 75 undergraduate students between the Health Information Management and Health Services Management degree programs — with HSM graduates filling management and logistics roles in hospital and clinical settings.

After graduation, ECU HIM students are qualified to take on roles in quality management, compliance, privacy and security, diagnostic and procedural coding, reimbursement methods and some data analytics, Harris said. For those who want to be part of the health care industry, but who may not have the stomach for blood and needles, a health information career can be ideal.

Compliance is an often-underappreciated responsibility for health care organizations, which often falls under the purview of HIM professionals who keep paperwork straight and employees current on their certifications to care for patients in hometown doctor’s offices to large, multistate health systems.

ECU’s HIM program started in 1972 and had about 15 graduates a year until 2013, producing more than 700 graduates since its inception.

In the 2012, ECU shifted focus to its master’s program in health informatics and information management, but soon HIM association members from across the state started to write and call, saying that a lack of qualified four-year degree graduates was putting strain on their ability to meet compliance and information management needs across the state.

“The HIM program was successfully reinstated through significant dedication and effort,” Harris said. By 2017, ECU and community college partners were well-positioned to implement initiatives to increase graduates from the four-year program, which led to the bilateral agreements that have already integrated graduates into North Carolina’s health information infrastructure.

To Everyone’s Benefit

This school year, the ECU’s HIM program has 20 seniors — seven of whom matriculated by way of one of the bilateral agreements ECU has with community colleges. Harris said she was reminded of that the first day of the fall semester when she walked into the classroom. Only 13 of her 20 seniors filled the seats because the others had already satisfied the requirement of the coding course in their community college programs.

Pitt Community College and ECU graduate Keri Schoonmaker is a health information management professional.

Harris said the bilateral agreement pathway helps students, and the eventual employers — and patients as well — because hospital administrators know that ECU health information graduates can tackle complex tasks on day one. Less accounting and information-related errors means less cost to the consumer.

Keri Schoonmaker, born and raised in Raleigh, started her career in a medical coding and billing program at Wake Technical Community College. But after speaking with an instructor, she realized she wasn’t on the right track and switched to the health information technology program at PCC. At the time of her graduation, she heard about the bilateral agreement with ECU and immediately enrolled.

“I ended up going for a dual bachelor’s in health services management and health information management,” Schoonmaker said, which made her even more marketable after graduation in 2020, at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

She’s now in a “highly desirable” work-from-home position with a major health care system with hospitals from Wilmington to Charlotte. The network of instructors-turned-peers that she met in both colleges have helped her to excel in her current role.

“Some of the instructors that I met at Pitt continue to help me throughout my time at ECU,” Schoonmaker said. “And the bachelor’s program just wasn’t available anywhere else in North Carolina at the time.”

Schoonmaker said she also benefitted from the Myra Brown Scholarship Fund, which provides HIM program graduates with money to take the registered health information administrator exam, which can run nearly $300.

The health information management community is small and tightknit, and the number of ECU grads is even smaller. Schoonmaker said they cheer one another along and celebrate “watching everyone’s career blossom.”

The Next Generation

Ashley Clinefelter is a Marching Pirate from Stokes — she plays the piccolo — and a HIM senior. She took classes at Davidson-Davie Community College and graduated from PCC’s HIT program. She said she was drawn to the medical field but knew she preferred a role that wasn’t focused on clinical practice.

Lindsey Ferguson holds a diploma following her graduation from Pitt Community College’s health information technology program.

Clinefelter said ECU’s learning environment suits her.

“Being here on the Health Sciences Campus allows you to continue with small class sizes to be able to talk to people without feeling overwhelmed with the tons of people on main campus,” Clinefelter said.

After graduation she plans to continue her education in ECU’s master’s level Health Informatics and Information Management program.

Lindsey Ferguson grew up in the small town of Conway, located in the northeastern part of North Carolina, where she still lives. After high school she started on a nursing track, becoming certified as a nursing assistant and phlebotomist, but then started a family which set her plans aside. She found a position as a patient account representative in a doctor’s office, then advanced to working in the lab before finding her true passion.

“I took a site specialist role, which is like an electronic health records support analyst. Once I saw behind the scenes of the clinical side, I fell in love. So, I found my niche and then I found Pitt Community College,” Ferguson said.

She graduated from PCC’s HIT program in December 2024 and passed the registered health information technician certification just after the New Year. This opened a new opportunity to work in a health information role from home and spend more quality time at home with her husband and kids.

“Obtaining my RHIT allowed me to obtain a position where I could work from home. My lunch breaks were spent by the pool and then right after clocking out for the day it was more pool time,” Ferguson said. “Family-life-work balance has been nice.”

Ferguson said she may be a distance education student but is putting in the work to stay connected with her health information peers in the workplace and in her college courses. She’s involved in two health services and information management associations and attended the North Carolina Health Information Management Association meeting held in Greenville at the end of September.

Ferguson is the first person in her family to take on a four-year degree and she chose ECU because of the partnership. With ECU being her hometown university, her parents can attend her graduation in May 2027.

“I wanted to attend a school where my parents could come and watch me walk across the stage without taking a flight. ECU was always my top choice, and I have always wanted to be a Pirate,” Ferguson said.

Schoonmaker and Ferguson both said they are grateful for the care they received from the teachers at PCC and ECU.

“They were fantastic,” Ferguson said. “They were my instructors, but they felt more like cheerleaders. They impacted me in a way that I will never be able to repay them.” 

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