BROADBAND: HELPING YOU WORK
Comforts of home
Fast internet assists remote workers Story by LISA SAVAGE Photography by MARK GILLILAND
Sabrina Wilferd, director of regulatory compliance at LifePoint Health, works from her home in Farmington.
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abrina Wilferd worked for years as a registered nurse at the hospital in Mayfield. In the medical field, she never dreamed she could spend her last few years before retirement working from home. Now, she’s doing just that. Wilferd is among a growing number of professionals choosing to work remotely. About 6.6% of Americans worked exclusively from home in 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. However, newer reports indicate that number has more than doubled. Working from home never crossed Wilferd’s mind early in her career. She worked directly with patients, but she transitioned to a position dealing with the clinical aspect of the conversion to electronic health records. Much of her job involved regulatory compliance. Even before she officially worked from home, technology
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allowed her to connect to hospital information using her home internet so she could access their system and address emergency issues. “I could dial in to the hospital system without having to go back to the hospital,” she says. “It wasn’t that far, but it always involved about 15 or 20 minutes one way.” After working at the hospital for 26 years, she left in 2009 and became a clinical electronic medical records implementations consultant, traveling to various medical facilities. When she wasn’t traveling, though, she could work out of her house. After a few years she grew tired of the travel, and in 2016, she joined Capella Healthcare, based in Nashville. The company merged with LifePoint Health and owns and operates about 80 hospitals around the country. She serves as director of regulatory compliance. Now, she rarely travels. WK&T Telecommunications Cooperative
