The demand for health information technology workers is surging as the government pushes health care providers to convert to electronic medical records and the nation’s population grows older.

Large health care organizations in the region report hiring increases this year as much as 37 percent for information technology workers with the ability to communicate with medical professionals. However, experienced health IT staff is in short supply, officials said.

Most jobs in the field pay between $45,000 and $90,000 a year, one official said.

Health care IT spending in the U.S. is expected to reach $40 billion by the end of this year, according to to a study from the market research firm RNCOS. The nation’s health care IT market is expected to grow at a rate of about 24 percent per year through 2014, the study said.

Health care IT promotes the use of electronic instead of paper records to maintain health information for patients and medical professionals. The use of electronic records and data analytics can help doctors diagnose health problems sooner, reduce medical errors, and provide safer care at lower costs, experts said.

“It is a technical part of the industry that requires certain experience and education, and those resources can be constrained at times,” said Jon Russell, Kettering Health Network’s chief information officer.

In a recent national survey, 22 percent of health care providers said inadequate staff resources was the main barrier to their IT implementation, according to the non-profit Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society.

Miami University this year launched a bachelor’s degree completion program in Health Information Technology at its regional campuses in Hamilton and Middletown to help meet regional workforce needs.

“There is really high demand right now for graduates who have both a technology and a medical background because of some of the federal incentives to move to electronic health records,” said Cathy Bishop-Clark, Miami’s chair and professor of Computer and Information Technology.

Miami’s Health IT program enrollment has risen from zero students in January to 110 current declared majors because of expected job growth, she said.

The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act enacted in 2009 provides funding to health care providers for the adoption and “meaningful use” of electronic health records.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requires health plans to begin adopting and implementing rules for the secure, confidential, electronic exchange of health information.

“Our industry is years behind some other industries, such as banking, for instance, in terms of being able to collaborate, share data and move data around,” said Paul Stoddard, chief information officer for Dayton-based Medicaid provider CareSource.

CareSource has hired nearly 70 IT workers this year, representing a 37 percent increase in IT staff, but still has 23 open positions, Stoddard said. CareSource employs about 190 full-time IT workers, plus an additional 20 to 50 contractors.

Premier Health Partners has seen a 10 percent increase in IT hiring, adding about 20 positions over the last four years to its IT staff of about 200, said Mikki Clancy, Premier’s system vice president and chief information officer.

Clancy expects that growth to continue at 2 to 3 percent because of the amount of work required to keep computer systems up to date with medical industry, regulatory, and health care reform changes. “I think there is demand for this for at least the next seven to 10 years,” she said.

Kettering Health Network nearly doubled its IT staff to more than 200 currently starting in 2009 to implement its electronic medical records system, but hiring has since leveled off, Russell said.

“There is going to be continued increase of information technology throughout the health care environment, which always drives the need for additional resources,” Russell said. “But you have to be realistic and say what can we support economically as a business.”

Kettering and Premier’s IT staffs both support numerous hospitals and physicians’ offices throughout the region, officials said. Both hospital systems have lost a number of experienced IT workers to other health care organizations across the state and nation that are implementing their own electronic medical records systems.

Health IT workers are needed at hospitals, doctors’ offices, nursing care facilities, outpatient care centers, insurance companies, federal and state government agencies, and health-related technology companies, Bishop-Clark said.

Health care IT salaries can range from $45,000 to $90,000, depending on skills and experience, Clancy said. Most positions require at least an associate’s or bachelor’s degree, she said.

Miami University student Jennifer Pugh of Middletown is majoring in health IT and feels positively about her job prospects after graduation. “I think it is really going to take off in the next few years,” she said.

Miami’s bachelor’s completion program covers the computer programming, networking and project management components of a traditional IT degree, along with medical-related courses to help students understand the world in which they will be working.

Miami has an articulation agreement with Sinclair Community College in Dayton that allows students to complete their first two years at Sinclair and then finish their degree at one of Miami’s regional campuses.

Sinclair also has run a health information technology workforce development program over the last two years that allows people with an IT background to learn about health care, and vice-versa, said Clancy, who is on that program’s faculty.

“That gave us the ability to train a lot of displaced workers and a lot of people looking to make career changes to influx into the health care market,” Clancy said.