Health and health care system leaders from the Great Lakes Bay Region and beyond convened at Saginaw Valley State University recently to learn about how to leverage national expertise for local communities.

This years conference continued the track record of featuring thought leaders from across the country, nationally recognized organizations and community health system improvements, said Cathy Baase, Michigan Health Information Alliance Board Chair and global director of health services for The Dow Chemical Co. It is wonderful to see the breadth of community leaders coming together for these shared learning experiences as we unite on a path to become a thriving community of health excellence.

Co-hosted by the Hospital Council of East Central Michigan, MiHIA, and Saginaw Valley State University, the Annual Health Conference is in its fifth year. This years conference focused on population health under the conference series title, The Regions Health and Health Care Systems: Communities Achieving Excellence and Accountability.

Attendees heard from Dr. George Flores, Dr. Janine Janosky and Genoveva Islas-Hooker in the areas of accountable care communities, looking at health in a time of reform, and the role of grassroots leaders in improving community health. Full information and presentations can be found on MiHIAs website at http://www.mihia.org and clicking on News and Events, and selecting the 5th Annual Health Care link.

We are in a time of significant change in healthcare, said Spence Maidlow, CEO of Covenant Health Care System and member of the MiHIA Board of Directors. The insights shared at the conference are valuable to our community as we examine the challenges and opportunities before us. This session on population health was especially helpful, real community examples.

Others on the MiHIA board, including Brenda Coughlin, president and CEO of Health Delivery Inc., agreed.

This conference helps us recognize that to maximize our regions health, we need to focus more on staying well and creating a healthy community than on treating disease, Coughlin said. I believe we are focused on our regional environment in this manner because of our growing partnerships through MiHIA.

Diane Postler-Slattery, president and CEO of MidMichigan Health and MiHIA board member, attended with 30 of her team members.

Gary Bilotti, project leader for MiHIAs regional Choosing Wisely campaign, was also on-hand at the conference, continuing to educate on the importance of providing consumers the right care at the right time and lists of commonly used tests that are often unnecessary and sometimes harmful.

MiHIAs vision of driving a thriving health community is what inspires us to support events like the 5th Annual Health Conference, said Kim Morley, CEO of MiHIA. Our ability to convene and connect the expertise and resources both in our region and beyond is what gives us hope about truly achieving this transformation.

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Conference brings national health expertise to region's leaders