Sonia Shiels, BA, CHIM

Sonia Shiels has over 25 years of experience in the health information management field, over nine years of experience managing two highly engaged remote coding teams, and over 15-years in decision support roles. Currently, Sonia works at St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton, a large teaching hospital, as manager of coding, data quality, reporting, and documentation improvement. In 2017 she worked with key stakeholders to bring this hospital, located in Hamilton, Ontario, to HIMMS level 6 through the adoption of an EMR. 

Another highlight of Sonia’s career was her previous role at the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care (MoHLTC) with the data quality team. During that time, she collaborated with health sector professionals on several MoHLTC data quality initiatives, including the 2015 Data Blitz sessions and the MOHLTC Data Quality Culture Initiative. 

Sonia is on the CHIMA Board of Directors and chairs the National Coding Collaborative (NCC). In the past, she sat on the Utilization Management Network of Ontario (UMNO) executive as the volunteer education coordinator. She has also worked with 3M Canada as a CDI auditor.

Rushik Patel, CHIM

Rushik Patel is the health information management, registration, and information services manager at Saskatchewan Health Authority. In addition, he is also a volunteer with CHIMA’s Saskatchewan chapter. 

After spending over half a decade in the field, Rushik realizes that health information management professionals are vital in the rapidly expanding health care ecosystem. 

Rushik has earned his HIM diploma from Saskatchewan Polytechnic.

Michelle Bamford, BSM, CHIM

Michelle is the manager for clinical information support at Island Health, in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. She is a health information management graduate from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, and achieved her bachelor of science in business/management in 2007 from the University of Phoenix. Michele also received a graduate certificate in leadership & management in 2012 from Royal Roads University.

Michele worked in Victoria for 37 years as a coder, analyst, coordinator, and manager. She currently has island-wide responsibility for 15 acute care hospitals in ICD-10-CA/CCI coding and abstracting. Her primary focus is on clinical data collection and uses in hospitals, including the Discharge Abstract Database (DAD), Perinatal Registry, and Trauma Registry.