Wednesday February 19, 2025
Chief Clinical Information Officer and Program Director eHealth, Nick Monypenny started his career as a nurse before pivoting into technology.
“My mum was a nurse, and she said to me, you should do nursing. You like people, you’ve got that kind of personality and you’ll always have a job. We’re never going to not have nurses.
“I’ve always been interested in being in health. I worked at a health software vendor for five years and then as COVID hit and my life circumstances changed, I wanted to get back into the health sector. In 2020 I came to Eastern Health and started as our Solution Architect and Programmer and then moved into the Associate Director of eHealth Operations and Enhancements role, before becoming the Program Director 18 months ago.”
Where Mr Monypenny finds a challenge, he also sees a world of opportunity. As the technology sector changes rapidly, he attempts to discover ways to use it to the advantage of our health service.
“In some respects, health has always been about, ‘how do you eat an infinitely sized elephant?’ There’s so many amazing opportunities and areas to explore. There are challenges that once we tackle them, they open amazing opportunities. There’s lots of considerations for how we go about expanding and consolidating our systems.
“The core consideration in my mind is, ‘how do we do so, in a way that is safe for our patients, safe for our staff, and sustainable so that we’re not having to backtrack?’ We want to make sure that when we come and implement, we’re doing so in a way that can uphold our level of service. What that’s targeting, is a commitment to an ever-increasing quality and level of service from the eHealth team.”
In Mr Monypenny’s eyes, the future where health and technology intersect, is bright. Coupled with a diverse team, anything is possible.
“I am very privileged to work with an amazing team of people who come from very diverse backgrounds in and out of health. They bring unique perspectives to how we solve health or digital health problems.
“On a more personal note, I live in the Eastern Health catchment. I find it incredibly rewarding to know the impact that we have on the consumers, on the people that are out there in the community, because I’m one of them. Technology moves so quickly, and we’ve absorbed it so fluidly in every other aspect of our lives. The positive impact that we can have is huge, not just on consumers, but on clinicians; making things easier, making boring administrative tasks go away. That’s where I really see the future of eHealth; making it more about the care and trying to reduce the overhead of all the systems and processes,” Mr Monypenny said.