Job SummaryAptive is seeking an experienced Clinical Informaticist III to support the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) Office of Health Informatics (OHI), Clinical Informatics and Data Management Office (OCI), in advancing the enterprise standard of care through improved data, tools, and informatics processes across 170+ VA Medical Centers.
This is a senior clinical informatics role. You will assess the information and knowledge-based needs of clinicians and Veterans, characterize and refine clinical processes, and lead the analysis, design, and continuous improvement of clinical decision support, clinical content, and standardized national workflows in the modernized electronic health record. You will translate complex clinical and operational problems into documented, defensible recommendations that VHA governance bodies and Tier 1 Subject Matter Experts can act on quickly.
Work on this program is organized under the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe). Analyses, decision support, and recommendations are delivered as Features within quarterly Planning Intervals, demonstrated to the government on a two-week cadence, and tracked in Jira and Jira Align.
The ideal candidate brings a clinical background, deep informatics expertise, strong facilitation skills, and the judgment to lead others and operate independently in a fast-moving, decision-driven environment.
Primary Responsibilities- Clinical Needs Assessment. Assess the information and knowledge-based needs of healthcare professionals and Veterans; characterize, evaluate, and refine clinical processes to improve safety, quality, and efficiency at the point of care.
- Clinical Workflow Analysis and Standardization. Analyze current- and future-state clinical workflows across surgical, primary care, dental, specialty care, pharmacy, and ancillary service areas; document processes using BPM+ notation and value stream mapping to drive enterprise workflow standardization.
- Clinical Decision Support. Develop, implement, evaluate, and continuously refine clinical decision support, order sets, PowerPlans, templates, alerts, and standardized clinical content in the federal EHR.
- Clinical Systems Lifecycle. Lead or participate in the customization, development, implementation, management, evaluation, and continuous improvement of clinical information systems and order-entry systems.
- Feature Delivery. Analyze government-provided problem statements and develop the lean business cases, epics, features, user stories, acceptance criteria, and non-functional requirements needed to execute work prioritized in Planning Interval planning.
- Agile Team Participation. Serve as a clinical subject matter expert on interdisciplinary agile teams; participate in daily stand-ups, iteration planning, PI planning, retrospectives, roadmap updates, and biweekly demonstration ceremonies, presenting both completed work and work in progress.
- Decision Management Support. Intake, capture, and triage incoming clinical decisions through a standardized process; determine the appropriate decision-making authority based on established criteria; and create, maintain, and disseminate decision logs communicating Tier 1 SME decisions to stakeholders.
- Governance and Consensus Building. Facilitate continuous exploration and iteration of standard configuration National Workflows, obtaining renewed consensus with Tier 1 SMEs, governing bodies, and VHA stakeholders; analyze emergent Courses of Action for adoption as standard workflow configurations or contingency plans.
- Clinical Content Migration. Support migration of Design Decision Matrices (DDMs), Data Collection Workbooks (DCWs), and problem resolution artifacts, and integrate workflows into a VA National Standards of Practice Model in partnership with Oracle Health.
- Value and Outcome Measurement. Perform value-based analysis of available healthcare data to assess and recommend how VA measures value delivered at the point of care; contribute to OKRs, KPIs, and leading indicators tied to safety, alignment to standard, timely access, cost reduction, automation, and provider and Veteran experience.
- Risk and Quality Management. Identify, document, and track clinical and functional risks and issues; maintain risk registers; convey impacts to relevant VHA offices; and support quality assurance activities.
- Stakeholder Engagement and Change Management. Engage clinical and operational stakeholders across VHACO, VISNs, and VAMCs; facilitate working sessions; and support communications and change management for informatics decisions and workflow changes.
- Mentorship and Leadership. Provide direction, technical review, and mentorship to junior informaticists and analysts; may manage or lead the work of others.
Minimum Qualifications- Advanced clinical degree (MSN, PharmD, MD, DO, DNP) or master's degree in health informatics or a related discipline.
- 10 years of progressive clinical informatics, health systems analysis, or EHR implementation and optimization experience.
- Clinical background such as registered nurse, nurse informaticist, pharmacist, physician, therapist, Health Informatics Specialist (HIS), or Clinical Application Coordinator (CAC).
- Demonstrated experience assessing clinical information needs, refining clinical processes, and developing or optimizing clinical decision support.
- Experience analyzing and documenting clinical workflows, including process mapping using BPM+ or comparable notation.
- Experience working in an Agile or Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) environment, including backlog management and delivery tracking in Jira and/or Jira Align.
- Expert-level proficiency with Microsoft Office 365, Power BI, Power Apps, and Power Automate, and advanced Excel skills.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to brief clinical and executive stakeholders and produce decision-quality documentation.
- Ability to work independently, manage multiple concurrent priorities, and deliver on a fixed iteration and Planning Interval cadence.
- Ability to obtain and maintain a public trust clearance.
- Completion of VA Privacy and Information Security Awareness and Rules of Behavior training (TMS #10176) upon onboarding and annually thereafter.
- Position is located within the United States; legal authorization to work in the U.S. is required.
Desired Qualifications- Informatics certification such as NI-BC (Nursing Informatics Board Certified), CPHIMS, or AMIA Health Informatics Certification.
- Direct VA or VHA experience, including work with OHI, OCI, CPMO, EHRM, or VA Medical Center informatics operations.
- Hands-on experience with Oracle Health (Cerner Millennium), including PowerChart, PowerPlans, PharmNet, or comparable module-level configuration.
- Experience with VistA/CPRS and legacy-to-modernized EHR transition, mapping, or dual-system workflow support.
- Experience supporting EHR governance bodies, decision boards, or Tier 1 SME structures in a large health system.
- Familiarity with ServiceNow, Remedy, Jazz, or robotic process automation applied to clinical workflow and ticketing integration.
- Experience with value stream mapping, Lean process improvement, or high reliability organization methods in healthcare.
- Experience mentoring or leading clinical informatics staff.
