Dr. K. Nadeem Ahmed is the first Chief Medical Information Officer (CMIO) at The Aga Khan University (AKU) and its global network of hospitals. He is acutely involved in strategic planning, implementation, and optimization of all clinical technology systems that support delivery of high-quality patient care, medical education, and research. He established AKU’s first multinational health informatics teams and actively leads efforts with clinical and technical leadership towards the ultimate goal of standardizing care, ensuring data integrity, and pursuing predictable outcomes.
Prior to joining AKU, Dr. Ahmed advised and worked with dozens of healthcare systems across the United States and Canada to deploy their electronic health record (EHR) with U.S. based Medical Information Technology (Meditech). As the assigned Meditech Physician Executive, he worked directly with physician leaders to form effective governance mechanisms and played a pivotal role helping them with key decisions regarding site and user specific configurations. Having worked with a multitude of hospital systems over the past decade, Dr. Ahmed has keenly observed that “we all seem to do the same work, but differently”.
While he was Medical Director of the Hospitalist program at Culpeper Regional Hospital, affiliated with the University of Virginia Health System, Dr. Ahmed had notable success directing a broad range of hospital-based initiatives including system-wide implementation of physician electronic order entry and documentation. In addition to co-founding Ridgeline Physician Services (a private practice) and managing the busy hospitalist service, he served as their Chief Physician Informaticst, Chairman of the Informatics and Quality & Risk Committees, and President-elect of the Medical Staff. He has expertise in successful inpatient practice management, EHR training methodologies, voice recognition software, and effective EHR deployment strategies.
Dr. Ahmed is U.S. Board Certified in Internal Medicine and completed his residency training at the Lehigh Valley Hospital – affiliated with Penn State College of Medicine. Prior to medical school, Dr. Ahmed worked as a Senior IT Systems Analyst at US Airways, where he supported its information system networks, developed Lotus Notes databases, and coordinated service level agreements with their key IT service providers.
As a practicing Physician with hands on IT experience, Dr. Ahmed understands the impact technology can have on healthcare, and he is a strong proponent of pushing technology to its limits to help improve it. He believes that although we may “do the same work differently”, the ultimate goals for better outcomes, increased efficiencies, and well-being of patients and providers, are the values that unite us.
