Maggie Dowies Voorhees, RHIA – Class of 2009

The Health Informatics and Information Management Department at Louisiana Tech University holds a special place in my heart and prepared me to become the best HIM professional I can be, so being asked to be the Outstanding Alumnus is a tremendous honor for me.

I graduated in Spring of 2009 and started my professional career at Northern Louisiana Medical Center working on the physician side of coding and billing. About a year into that path, a position opened on the Hospital side in the HIM department for an Outpatient Coder. I was fortunate to move to that position and I spent the next 9 years there coding Diagnostic, Emergency Room and some Outpatient Surgery accounts. I swore in Mrs. Jan Fuller’s Coding and Reimbursement classes that I would never be a coder, and told anyone and everyone that would listen – but my mind was fully changed when I started coding and my love for it really emerged.

In 2019 Union General Hospital reached out to me in hopes that I would be interested in filling their HIM Director position that was coming open. While I was honored by the interest, I was also shocked and unsure if I was ready or would be a good fit; for such a position but ultimately I accepted and so began my Director adventures. At Union General, I was blessed to be surrounded by numerous HIM professionals who taught me more than I could have ever imagined and opened my eyes to the Quality and Compliance side of our world. The Covid 19 pandemic occurred while I was there and that change effected not only the patient care workers, but also the non-patient care workers – but we made it through.

When I left Northern Louisiana Medical Center in 2019, my boss encouraged me to go learn and be ready for when she retired and she would reach out when her position became available. In 2021 that call happened and I was so excited to come back to my hometown Hospital and bring the knowledge I had learned at Union General to Northern Louisiana Medical Center. Even though the two hospitals are vastly different, there are aspects of the HIM world that are always the same. The HIM department at NLMC welcomed me back with open arms and we haven’t looked back. I serve as not only the HIM Director but also the Facility Privacy Officer and the Registration Director. The part of my job that I cherish the most is being able to serve as a site for HIIM Students who are completing their internships. Spending two weeks with the students allows me to show them how a HIM Department functions in the real world and all of the different avenues there are with our degree.

I loved my years at Tech and the relationship I have with the HIIM Department and I know that the path my career has taken me is all due to this amazing department!