Health IT Faculty – Office of Professional Programs

Courses are taught by instructors prominent in Health IT industry as well as faculty in the Information Systems department. These members conduct cutting edge research in Health IT for some of Health IT’s biggest government and commercial organizations. The program is infused with their unique combination of real-world experience in industry and research. To learn more about their classes, visit the Health Informatics course description page.

Erin Van Dyke, Ph.D. | Graduate Program Director

Ph.D., Information Systems, UMBC
M.S., Information Systems, UMBC

Dr. Van Dyke has years of experience working in the healthcare industry, with an emphasis in program oversight and administration, evaluation, teaching, curriculum design, and stakeholder engagement in university and clinical environments. A proud UMBC alumna and member of the community since 2011, she previously worked with the Department of Nursing at the Johns Hopkins Hospital for 10 years.

She began her career at Hopkins in Nursing Informatics where she coordinated at-the-elbow support for nurses during the roll-out and optimization of two electronic health record systems. It was through this experience that she witnessed how the implementation of technology affected nursing practice and the clinical work environment.

Dr. Van Dyke joined the Healthy Work Environment Research Grant team at Johns Hopkins Nursing, where she progressed from a Data Analyst to a Research and Evaluation Associate specializing in qualitative research methodologies. Dr. Van Dyke then employed qualitative and evaluation methodologies to complete a Master’s thesis evaluating factors that improve the usability of clinical information systems for bedside nurses.

Establishing an evaluation program for a new leadership development center within the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Dr. Van Dyke led this program as the Associate Director for Assessment & Evaluation. She also expanded her role to include the duties of Research Scientist.

In addition to her work at Hopkins, she completed her doctoral research in 2019, where she identified role-specific informatics competencies that nurse leaders require to support their staff through the implementation and adoption of new innovations.

Raphael L. Aquino | Adjunct Faculty

M.S., Management of Information Technology, University of Virginia
B.S., Computer Information Systems, St. Leo University

Mr. Raphael L. Aquino has over 20 years of Information Technology experience, with over 15 years focused on Healthcare Technology. He currently works as a federally appointed Information Technology Manager at the National Institute of Health, National Cancer Institute.

Before joining the NIH, Mr. Aquino was a healthcare IT consultant for over ten years and has clients ranging from federal and state agencies (Defense Health Agency, New York City Health + Hospitals) to large healthcare systems (Novant Health, Baptist Health System, Cone Healthcare, Fairview Healthcare Systems), teaching/university hospitals (Robert Wood Johnson University Hospitals, University of Michigan, Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals), regional and children’s hospitals (Hendricks Regional Hospital, Valley Children’s Healthcare) in several different capacities –from a Senior Director to Program Manager to Senior Architect.

He has implemented several hospital and clinical systems, from interface/integration tools to FDA-approved clinical/medical applications. His expertise includes Biomedical Device Integration (BMDI), third-party clinical applications, and the build, integration, and implementation of electronic health records (EHR)systems. He has worked on large-scale complex projects at several healthcare systems across the United States and was one of the pioneers of EHR enterprise ventilator integration. He presented at the Epic User Group Meeting (UGM) in 2009 and at Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) in 2012 and shared his project implementation strategies and success during his tenure at Sentara Healthcare System as a Technical Manager. He worked closely with medical device and health technology vendors like Philips, GE, Hamilton Medical, Epic, and CapsuleTech to develop, improve and implement medical devices, 510K FDA-approved IT solutions, software integration tools, and electronic health records systems. His BMDI implementation methods are widely used in the industry today.

Prior to shifting to healthcare information technology, Mr. Aquino was a software developer/programmer and launched several commercial dynamic websites, database warehouses, automated reporting tools, and Internet/Intranet applications for the federal, banking, auto, and marketing industries.

Mr. Aquino holds a Master’s Degree in Management of Information Technology from the University of Virginia, McIntire School of Commerce, and a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Information Systems from St. Leo University.

Joann Klinedinst, M.Ed., CPHIMS, DES, PMP, CPTD, LFHIMSS, FACHE, FCAHME | Adjunct Faculty

M.Ed., Adult Education, The Pennsylvania State University

As vice president of professional development for HIMSS, based in Chicago, IL, USA, JoAnn W. Klinedinst defines strategies that attribute to the lifelong learning, continuing engagement, and professional development of120,000+ health IT professionals globally. Prior to this appointment, Ms. Klinedinst led the applications development efforts in both the acute and ambulatory care settings at Doylestown Hospital, Doylestown, PA. As a long-term health IT professional and member of HIMSS, Ms. Klinedinst is uniquely positioned to offer advice for continuing professional development for health and healthcare professionals based on both her professional and personal experiences. She holds a Masters in Adult Education from The Pennsylvania State University as well as industry certifications for the Certified Professional in Healthcare Information and Management Systems (CPHIMS) from HIMSS, the Digital Event Strategist (DES) from the Professional Convention Manager’s Association, the Project Management Professional (PMP) designation from the Project Management Institute, the Certified Professional in Talent Development (CPTD) from the Association of Talent Development, the FACHE Board Certification from the American College of Healthcare Executives, is a Life Fellow of HIMSS(LFHIMSS), and is a Fellow of the Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Management Executives (CAHME). Ms. Klinedinst is a past member of the Board of Directors for The Commission on the Accreditation for Healthcare Management Education(CAHME); she is a member of the Healthcare Informatics Advisory Council of St. Joseph’s University, Philadelphia, PA; she serves as a Director on the Foundation Board of Grand View Health (Sellersville, PA), and she serves on the Health Systems Management External Advisory Board of the Loyola University Chicago, Parkinson School of Health Sciences and Public Health, Loyola University, Chicago, IL. Moreover, Ms. Klinedinst served as author/editor for The Handbook of Continuing Professional Development for the Health IT Professional (Taylor and Francis, LLC, April 2017; Second Edition, March 2022).

Isaac Mativo | Graduate Faculty

Ph.D., Computer Science, UMBC
M.S., Computer Science, UMBC
B.S., Computer Science, UMBC

Dr. Isaac Mativo is a experienced Information Technology professional with a passion for Health Information Technology. He has over 20 years of experience as an engineer, project/program manager, and director. In his various roles, he has worked for the National Institutes of Health’s National Cancer Institute (NIH-NCA) as a Software Engineer and Program Manager, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a Director and Program Manager, the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and the other federal government agencies. Dr. Mativo’s work has included supporting clinical trials in precision medicine, use of risk modeling simulations for tobacco carcinogenic risk, and the integration of patient data from disparate sources.

Dr. Mativo has performed work in the non-clinical space in support of the biopharma industry in both regulatory compliance and in research and development helping users gain insights from their data. Dr. Mativo’s management experience includes business and technical process improvement, contract and vendor management, and strategic business alignment. Dr. Mativo is a certified Project Manager Professional (PMP) who is passionate about the use of managerial best practices in Information Technology. He has experience creating collaborative environments for various stakeholders, building multi-disciplinary teams, and effectively communicating technical and non-technical information across diverse audiences.

Dr. Mativo holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). His research has focused on novel techniques of improving clinical outcome prediction using machine learning. He has worked on creating extendable and personalized clinical predictive models that continually learn from patient data. His research also explores patient similarity in the context of personalized medicine.

Sasa Miskovic| Adjunct Faculty

M.S., Healthcare Informatics., Chatham University
B.S.N., Duquesne University (Pittsburgh, PA), 2014

Sasa Miskovic is a Lead Product Manager/Scrum Master working at ThoroughCare in Pittsburgh, PA. ThoroughCare is a suite of Integrated care coordination software providing physician practices with tools such as Chronic Care Management, Remote Patient Monitor, Behavioral Health Integration, and more. In his current role and past experiences, he has expertise in clinical knowledge, Agile processes, EMR software configuration, Project Management, Product Management, Scrum, etc. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Duquesne University and a Master of Science in Healthcare Informatics from Chatham University. He is certified in multiple EMR (Epic & Allscripts) software throughout his career and continues to build his Product Management portfolio through several projects, client relationships, and healthcare software management. He has supported many projects throughout his career that all directly affect safe patient care and exemplary standards for Clinical Transformation, and clinical software advancement.

John Paul Mulhern, M.B.A., LCSW-C | Graduate Faculty

M.B.A., Mount Saint Mary’s University
M.S.W., University of Baltimore

Paul has over twenty years of experience in health IT as a licensed clinical provider and program manager. Paul has managed health it projects for private payer organizations including Magellan Health and Johns Hopkins. Both organizations support public payer products including Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare as well as private/employer sponsored health plans. Paul has also managed health IT projects for the Federal Government including the National Cancer Institute, the Department of Defense and the Department of Veteran Affairs.

Paul’s health IT program/project management experience includes financial, technical and human management of healthcare programs as well as the entire lifecycle of healthcare clinical, claims and research information systems, which are utilized within those programs. He has worked with senior healthcare leaders in public and private setting to identify and document high-level programmatic strategy and identify, prioritize and document projects to support the program goals in support of the broader strategic goals of the organization. This includes designing and implementing systems to fulfill business objectives while maintaining focus on core business goals within a broader strategy, throughout the development and implementation of healthcare information systems.

In all settings, Paul has collaborated with a broad spectrum of stakeholders including employees, contractors, clients, providers, researchers, regulators, advocates and more. At UMBC, Paul managed bioinformatics research collaboration with the Baltimore VA before starting as a part time faculty. Paul is a licensed social worker in the State of Maryland.

Terry Tsai, M.S.P.H., Ph.D. | Graduate Faculty

Ph.D., Biomedical and Health Informatics, University of Washington
M.S.P.H., Public Health Informatics, Emory University
B.B.A., Information Technology, College of William and Mary

Dr. Terry Tsai has an extensive and diverse background in biomedical and health informatics, in the domains of clinical and translational medicine, with a particular emphasis on patient safety and population genetics. Her research interests include: data integration, text mining, decision analysis, genetic epidemiology, patient safety, and patient advocacy.

Dr. Tsai was previously a faculty member at the University of Maryland Baltimore, working on numerous projects including a research grant related to heart disease in rural hospitals as well as another grant dealing with microbiota and its impact on pre-term birth. She has also been a faculty member at the Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality, working on various patient quality initiatives: including the Surgical Unit-based Safety Program (SUSP) to Reduce Surgical Site Infections (SSI) and Other Surgical Complications as well as the Comprehensive Unit-Based Safety Program (CUSP) for Ventilator Associated Pneumonia (VAP) Preventions initiative. She is currently a Faculty Research Associate at Johns Hopkins University, within the Division of Health Sciences Informatics, serving as the PI on an AHRQ R03 grant focused on decision making for hospital decision makers when prioritizing patient safety initiatives.

Dr. Tsai holds a Ph.D. in Biomedical and Health Informatics from the University of Washington in Seattle as well as master’s degree in Public Health Informatics from Emory University in Atlanta. She completed her postdoctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins University.

Lois Walters-Threat, D.N.P.| Adjunct Faculty

D.N.P., Nursing Informatics, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
M.S., Health Informatics, University of Illinois at Chicago
B.S., Virginia Commonwealth University

Dr. Lois Walters-Threat has over 10 years of health information technology experience and over 25 years nursing, compliance, workflow, and process improvement experience. She is as a content expert for the Magnet Recognition Program at American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) in Silver Spring, MD. She previously worked with the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), analyzing consumer injury data. Over the past decade, she has been involved in work and initiatives with the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA, e.g., DEI white papers, peer reviewer, and content creator for the AHIC certification). Dr. Walters-Threat is a freelance content creator for the informatics field and volunteers with various workgroups such as the Omaha System Partnership and CDC SDOH Public Health Use Case Workgroup. Dr. Walters-Threat earned a Master of Science in Health Informatics from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a Doctor of Nursing Practice (Nursing Informatics) from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities.

Faculty with an interest in Health Information Technology:

Lujie Karen Chen, Ph.D.
Zhiyuan Chen, Ph.D.
Aryya Gangopadhyay, Ph.D.
Vandana Janeja, Ph.D.
A. Gunes Koru, Ph.D. (Faculty Emeriti)
Anthony F. Norcio, Ph.D. (Faculty Emeriti)
Patti Ordóñez, Ph.D.
Sanjay Purushotham, Ph.D.
Tera Reynolds, Ph.D.
Roy Rada, Ph.D. (Faculty Emeriti)
Ian Stockwell, Ph.D.

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