Question: Do we think SFIA is a sensible starting point:
Already has a lot in it - is internationally recognised and understood. CIOs recognise this, and we could build on this?
Need to find the gaps and work on filling them
We should consider what is happening in Australia - they are developing something similar
Needs to recognise the different skills that clinical informaticians bring in different domain
Where does CHIA fit with this?
How does this fit with the isolation and
SFIA - similar to IT Professionals NZ, British Computing Society have a similar/separate connection to training models - might be worth considering in how it is implemented - ITP is happy to help (Karolyn Kerr).
Need to confirm our reasons for this - this will allow us to ensure that SFIA works for us.
Canada Digital Health Framework - another option to start with
Answer: Start with this - evaluate and develop as required - will ensure that aligned with CIOs but happy to jump (eg. like Cochrane)
Ideas to progress this
Self Assessment for CiLN - see where we fit against SFIA, where they think their job should be and what is missing
How do we assess undergraduate skills and experience against SFIA - for these people is it about good digital literacy - how do we separate the use of technology from the creation/governance/value creation of technology (clinician creator/innovator).
Some additional information below which may help the conversation. I’m concerned that we are being distracted from the problems we’re aiming to solve and the purpose of a skills framework.
Based on what I understand, we are considering the SFIA as one option to use as a guide to inform what skills may be applicable for people working in clinical informatics roles.
Other countries have already done substantial work, some also already have incorporated SFIA:
Furthermore, I would strongly suggest that developing a skills/competency framework should not be done exclusively of other key components. An example being HEE:
Health Education England - Developing a Digital Ready Workforce includes 4 pillars, of which should be developed in parallel:
“Building upon the Health Informatics Career Framework (HICF) and Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA), the ISF will identify and define the required skills and competencies for each role, describing and identifying how these standards and core skills should be developed and applied.” The Health Foundation - North West Skills Development Network. This project is under way, and will run until October 2020.
In addition to Clinical Informatics skills, we will also need a skilled technical workforce to support clinical teams to inform decision making and training requirements. In that sense, I believe we can just use the what exists internationally, including tools like SFIA, as a baseline for many of the technical roles: UK Gov. Digital, Data and Technology Profession Capability Framework
The transcription of the feedback to the whole group:
So we wrote directly into the, into the system. And we ask the first question, which is a fear of sensible starting point. So, a lot of opinions about whether it was or wasn’t that last thing from Lucy and Karen, I think, sort of highlight some of the gaps that kind of came up in the conversation around our table. But we kind of thought we should be a little bit like Cochrane, we by when better evidence comes along, we should not feel not feel like we shouldn’t take on the new evidence. So let’s start with that maybe and the two ideas that we then kind of want to think through in terms of progressing that as we should use Come to self assess against the fear to highlight the gaps that might be in Sofia. One of the observations I would make is that it tends not to focus on the health element or on the data element as much as on the IT element. The benefit of (inaudible) is the fact that the CIOs are enamored with it. So maybe that’s the starting point. The other kind of thing that came up in the conversation was the difference between and that’s kind of at the bottom near in terms of number two, the undergraduate view of the world versus kind of us. And the thought that there’s a different set of skills in terms of digital literacy, which might be about using technology, not necessarily that creation, governance, value creation and or innovation type role with regard to technology. So that was kind of the other Delta that we weren’t really sure that SFIA kind of hits the nail on the head for. So in summary, yes, good starting point, especially because it’s aligned to other people. But we shouldn’t be afraid to jump ship. If we see something better all we can do something better. And then the other part is, we should be using what we already know and measuring ourselves against it in order to try and find gaps that we might need a film.
I haven’t had a read through yet but I think it could be good to see what we could adopt/adapt for NZ through CiLN. Could the CiLN leaders provide an update on what’s happening with the development of a competency framework?
Thanks for sharing this Michael- interesting to see they have gone with competencies and not capabilities. Competencies describe the skills needed in a current, stable and known environment whereas capabilities describe the skills needed for a future state, within a complex, dynamic and changing environment. I suggest that capabilities better describe the skills clinical informaticians need.
As you know I have developed and shared both a clinical informatics stakeholder engagement framework and a capability framework with the Health and Disability review team, and have presented these at the HiNZ conference, and have shared widely with colleagues across NZ and Australia.
I was disappointed to see that nothing about the importance of a clinical informatics workforce and the capabilities, skills and knowledge required to do these roles was included in the Health and Disability Review.
Publishing the Position Statement last year was our first step in working towards elevating our roles across the sector, and more work needs to be done in this space. While the CiLN advisory panel is a group of dedicated people, we are a voluntary organisation with some limitations on the pace that we can produce these pieces of thought leadership. Doing more work is on the work plan for the next year, however I am sure you will appreciate that we are all a little stretched at the moment working on Covid resurgence planning.
If anyone else in our community wants to publish a CiLN capability framework, I one all prepared that can be reused. It just needs to be validated with the community and written up.
