Harrison CIO earns healthcare leader distinction Adar Palis, Harrison Medical Center’s vice president of administration and chief information officer, recently was named to the Becker’s Hospital Review list of “Rising Stars: 25 Healthcare Leaders Under Age 40.”
Harrison Medical Center offers new radiation treatment for cancer care
electronic medical records project at Harrison Medical Center. After three years, the project is three-quarters complete, with bedside medication bar-coding and computerized physician order entry on tap for 2011. As part of his continuing efforts to implement electronic health record technology, Palis will lead the rollout of a communitywide HIE in early 2011. Palis graduated magna cum laude from Seattle Pacific University and holds six Microsoft technical certifications. Becker’s Hospital Review is a national bimonthly publication offering up-to-date
business and legal news and analysis relating to hospitals and health systems. The content includes hospital and health system news, best practices, and legal guidance specifically for these decision makers. For more information, visit www.beckershospitalreview.com. Palis also earned the Kitsap Peninsula Business Journal’s “40 Under Forty” honor in 2005 in which the Kitsap Peninsula’s best, brightest, and most outstanding individuals under the age of 40 are chosen from a panel of local leaders, elected officials and business people.
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Harrison Medical Center has upgraded its radiation oncology treatment equipment and software to provide physicians and patients with more choice in treating complicated cancers. RapidArc technology is a new form of image-guided, intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) that improves tumor targeting and shapes the radiation dose so that it conforms more closely to the threedimensional shape of the tumor. This means more dose to the tumor and less to surrounding healthy tissue. The treatment has been available at Harrison for several months, and required an upgrade to the linear accelerator equipment. It can be used for all types of cancer, and typically for more complicated cases. “It’s a huge advance in IMRT. For us, it will eventually be the IMRT treatment most commonly used,” said Dr. Charles Springate, a radiation oncologist at Harrison. As part of the cancer diagnosis, the medical team generates threedimensional diagnostic images (usually CT or MRI) of the patient's anatomy. These images are used to specify the dose of radiation needed to treat the tumor. In some cases, treatment planning includes a simulation session to further localize the cancer. During a RapidArc treatment, the linear accelerator rotates around the patient to deliver the radiation from nearly every angle. The radiation is shaped and reshaped as it is continuously delivered from virtually every angle in a 360-degree revolution around the patient. Treatment during a 360-degree revolution takes less than two minutes. The benefit to patients includes shorter treatment sessions — up to 85 percent shorter — from six or seven minutes to approximately one. Patients are immobilized for a shorter amount of time so there’s reduced discomfort due to reduced exposure to radiation. The technology can also mean cost-savings for the facility because of the shorter staffing time required. “There’s virtually no downside to it,” Springate said. He noted that Harrison has several state-of-the-art technologies available for treatment of cancer. “Many places in Seattle don’t even have these,” he said.
Palis, 32, joined Harrison Medical Center in 2002 as a network engineer and was later named CIO of the hospital in 2005, becoming the organization’s youngest executive at age 27. He quickly initiated significant changes, such as establishing a more customer-focused IT department, constructing a state-of-the-art data center, installing a new network infrastructure to include remote campuses digitizing X-rays and introducing free wireless across all Harrison campuses. Palis has spearheaded a multiyear project to implement a $30.5 million