Per the HEALTHeLINK Privacy and Security Policies and Procedures, each participant must notify HEALTHeLINK of the termination of an authorized user’s employment or affiliation with the participant immediately or as promptly as reasonably practicable but in any event within 1 business day of termination. Authorized contacts can use the AC Portal to submit deactivations. Monthly review of authorized user lists is required. 



HEALTHeLINK is a Phase 2 winner of the Building Bridges to Better Health: A Primary Health Care Challenge sponsored by the Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA). The goal of this multi-phase challenge is to enhance access and care coordination to achieve better health and reduce disparities utilizing technical assistance solutions. HEALTHeLINK built HEALTHeQUALITY, an innovative solution to help address gaps in care to improve the overall quality of care.

During the pilot phase, all eligible patients at The Chautauqua Center were queried for cancer screening gaps utilizing HEALTHeQUALITY. For all patients queried, a comment was added in their electronic health record noting if screening was completed or if patient needed to be contacted. These follow-ups were able to occur within days rather than months. As a result, The Chautauqua Center increased its breast cancer screenings by 19%, colorectal cancer screenings by 21%, and cervical cancer screenings by 23% when compared with screening rates from 2021. 

HEALTHeLINK was awarded $20,000 to help fund our project through Phase 3 of the challenge and will be expanding upon HEALTHeQUALITY’s current functionality. 

The HEALTHeLINK Regional Health Improvement Team is developing a comprehensive and user-friendly community dashboard to present the current state of community and population health across Western New York. The dashboard will give our community partners an impression of where and how we might focus our efforts on inspiring health improvement to maximize community benefit. Specifically, the dashboard will enable our partners to identify the most significant health disparities and the root causes of those disparities that put communities at risk for poor health outcomes.

HEALTHeLINK is partnering with CCNY, Inc. for a series of focus groups with community partners from various sectors across the WNY region to understand the challenges, opportunities, and best practices in developing an informative and actionable public-facing dashboard that will empower healthcare providers, policymakers, and community stakeholders. The intention is to identify key health indicators and discuss essential features that the dashboard should encompass to harness the power of data and create positive health outcomes for all members of our community; that will help us to effectively disseminate the data while ensuring it is informative and actionable for display in a public-facing dashboard. 

As part of our focus on population health, HEALTHeLINK is the first Qualified Entity (QE) in the state to join the New York State, “Start at 9” Campaign to Prevent HPV Cancers in partnership with the New York State Cancer Consortium and New York State HPV Coalition to address low HPV vaccination rates in adolescents.

The latest research suggests that starting the HPV vaccination series, which is safe and extremely effective in preventing HPV infections and cancers, at age 9 can increase the percentage of patients who are up to date by age 13.

Jennifer Lane, PMP/CSM was named vice president, technology, providing the technology strategy and innovation for HEALTHeLINK. With more than 20 years of program management experience within IT and human resources, she has been with HEALTHeLINK since 2015 and most recently was director, project management.

Denise Marshall was promoted to assistant vice president, technology, managing the integration, performance, and quality of all incoming and outgoing data, as well as the analysis and reporting of metrics and measures. She joined HEALTHeLINK in 2007 as one of its original team members and most recently served as senior manager, analytics & systems management.

Named to senior manager, technology, Audrey Lachina is responsible for integration services, as well as research, design, and development of new technical solutions. With HEALTHeLINK for more than a decade, she was previously senior solutions analyst.

Chris Klimek, MBA was promoted to manager, infrastructure and security officer. In this role, he develops and maintains the HEALTHeLINK security program to ensure patient health information remains private and secure. With HEALTHeLINK since 2019, he most recently was lead IT security analyst.

Drew McNichol was named special advisor to the CEO. With more than 30 years of experience in information technology on an international scale, he previously served as director, technology and security officer. In addition to McNichol’s new role with HEALTHeLINK, he also works with the New York eHealth Collaborative as director of support organization strategy where he is providing leadership on issues related to the development of strategies for implementing SHIN-NY statewide services, including a statewide data repository, and shared services.  

On May 25, Dr. Karen Craik, senior manager, regional health improvement, graduated from the Institute for Nonprofit Practice’s signature leadership program earning a certificate in Social Impact Management & Leadership. This nine-month comprehensive program equips nonprofit, public, and social impact leaders with the skills, knowledge, and networks they need to make strategic, mission-driven decisions that center around diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging and effect meaningful change in their organizations.

INP is working to transform the nonprofit sector so that it is exponentially more equitable, diverse, and connected and we are excited to support them as they grow into the WNY community.

Alyssa Russillio, who recently joined HEALTHeLINK as a project manager was named to Business First’s 2023 30 Under 30. She previously was a hospital program supervisor at John R. Oishei Children’s Hospital.



HEALTHeLINK’s Guide 2 Better Care segments air every other Wednesday on WGRZ-TV, during the 4pm and 11pm newscasts. Local health care leaders provide education about HEALTHeLINK as well as highlight the value and benefits of HIE in Western New York.