The University Health System recently appointed Dr. Michael Williams as its first chief medical information officer, a position geared toward bridging the health system's information technology and clinical personnel.
In his new role, Williams, a Harvard Medical School graduate, will assess how effective the University is in using information technology to identify and close any gaps.
“One of the main areas Dr. Williams will focus on is how to take advantage of all the clinical applications available to our clinicians to help them enhance patient care,” Health System spokesperson Eric Swensen said.
Williams will work as a practicing pediatrician, attending to patients one day a week, while serving as a liaison between IT providers and doctors the rest of the week.
Rick Skinner, the Health System's chief information and technology officer, collaborated with Chief Medical Officer Dr. Chris A. Ghaemmaghami to create the position.
Skinner said Williams was the most qualified candidate for the position, due to his previous experience as a chief medical information officer at the Medical Center of Central Georgia.
The medical field is increasingly dependent on technological and information-heavy advancements, Skinner said.
“[The future holds] more and more use of data to design and measure new care processes, treatments, [and] new ways of doing things," he said.
With today’s digitalized patient records, he said, it is easy to analyze data and use past experience and data to improve care.
Read More
Dr. Sarah Flowers discusses pathology and genetic risk in Alzheimer’s disease
By Charlotte Gabriel | 2 days agoThe “U Ask, U.Va. Answers” speaker series is hosted by the Office of the Vice President for Research with the goal of presenting University research to the Charlottesville community and sparking curiosity in the public.
U.Va. Health Emergency Department among most expensive trauma centers in Virginia
By Michael Racz | 3 days agoIn comparison to other nonprofit level 1 trauma centers in Virginia, the University Medical Center had the highest self-pay rate — the amount charged to patients who pay out-of-pocket rather than through insurance — for Emergency Department facility fees and was among the most expensive for other treatment services, including CT scans and various blood tests, based on published pricing data.
U.Va. Health first in Virginia to use a temporary heart pump in a pediatric patient
By Isabela Delgado | September 6, 2026According to the National Institutes of Health, the Impella device is a miniature catheter-based device, in which a long tube is “placed in the left ventricle across the aortic valve" to pump blood and maintain a systemic circulation.
