The Electronic Medical Record (EMR) team is excited to announce that Dr Sing Tan has recently joined the team as the Deputy Chief Medical Informatics Officer.

Sing started his medical career in 2009 as an ICU Intensivist. “I have always been fascinated by technology and the power of data, as well as health system design. ICU was the perfect blend of this. It is a high-tech environment where physiological measurements such as blood pressure and oxygen levels are measured by the second, and the data is then used to titrate and adjust therapies,” says Sing.

Sing has been with Northern Health for three years, and joined the EMR team as the Senior Medical Analyst-ICU when the project kick-started back in 2021. During his time with the EMR team, he has been involved in designing and validating medical workflows, especially in the intensive care space. With the EMR project moving away from system design and build, into system testing and operational readiness, Sing was the perfect fit as Deputy Chief Medical Informatics Officer.

“EMR is a significant transformation project and a key success factor is adoption, therefore Sing’s engagement with our clinicians will be key to its success,” says Trish Aldridge, EMR Program Director.

When asked about what made him decide to transition to a deputy role, Sing said the answer lies within digital health.

“Northern Health’s leadership has a strong commitment to leverage digital health innovations to improve quality, safety, and efficiency for our staff, patients, and community. This role allows me to tap into this territory of the unknown and is a rare opportunity for me to contribute to this major initiative that the whole organisation is working towards, and I am very excited to see the benefits that the EMR will bring to Northern Health,” says Sing.

Having worked at various hospitals with varying levels of EMR adoption, Sing found it most beneficial from a medical perspective when the flow of information between individuals, for example, doctor’s orders to pathology, is improved, and when patient care is improved due to generation of insights backed up by system data.

“With Northern Health EMR going live in September 2023, I hope to see the earliest impact to our medical staff to be a reduction in workflow inefficiencies, such as the 10 minute walk to radiology to put in a request slip, or the minutes spent looking for the patient’s drug chart,” adds Sing.

With great love for his clinical work, he now works part-time in both EMR and ICU spaces.

“The universal experience with EMR go-live is that it will be challenging, even in the most well-planned and executed settings. We fully recognise the challenging clinical landscape at Northern Health, however, I am confident that we can work together and support each other to launch an EMR in a safe and effective manner,” Sing concludes.

A very warm welcome to Dr Sing from the EMR team!