Yolanda Briggs

Yolanda Briggs graduated the same year her hospital system's employer went through a full transition to electronic health records, and says the timing was equal parts lucky and brutal. "I learned coding compliance on paper charts in my junior year and watched the whole system convert to digital by the time I started my first job. Porter's HIM program had already taught us both systems side by side, on purpose, because faculty could see the transition coming across the industry. Half my cohort walked into interviews as the only new grads who'd actually touched a paper chart AND an EHR."

Fifteen years later she directs health information for a multi-site hospital system, overseeing coding accuracy, release-of-information compliance, and a staff of eighteen. "The job is invisible when it's done right — nobody notices health information management until a record is wrong, a claim is denied, or an audit finds a gap. I tell new hires that being unnoticed is the actual goal."