When SERHA launched the Electronic Health Record (EHR) system in 2024, it marked one of the most ambitious digital transitions in Jamaica’s health sector.
While such transformation requires infrastructure, software, and policy, its true success depends on people who are willing to adapt, learn, and guide others. Among the many staff navigating this new digital landscape, Sophia Lothan, an Electronic Records Technician, quickly emerged as one of SERHA’s Top Change Champions of 2025, demonstrating resilience, innovation, and an unwavering commitment to excellence.
When the EHR was first introduced, many felt overwhelmed, unsure of how to navigate this unfamiliar system. But for Sophia, the introduction sparked curiosity rather than fear. With encouragement and ongoing support from Dr. Hines and Dr. Barwise, she began exploring beyond what was taught testing features, troubleshooting errors, and uncovering hidden functions that would eventually become essential to daily operations. “Initially, we learned the basics of the system,” she shared, “but the more I explored, the more I realized just how powerful the system was and how much the system could really do.” That curiosity grew into competence, and competence evolved into leadership.
Rooted in her respect for data integrity, Sophia embraced the core digital-health principle: garbage in, garbage out. She took ownership of ensuring that the information entered into the system was accurate and reliable, understanding that a high-performing EHR depends on quality input. She implemented the practice of ending referrals once patients were discharged to protect confidentiality, redesigned the printed face sheet so only demographic information appeared, mastered the system’s search tools to improve accuracy, corrected discharge errors, merged duplicate records, updated demographic data, and carried out dozens of essential tasks that strengthened both workflow and patient safety.
Through constant exploration, she discovered buried features like the hospital-visit history within the clinical tree-what she jokingly calls “one of the best things since sliced bread.” She mastered linking babies born outside the hospital to their mothers’ records, adding alerts to patient profiles, creating appointment rotas, updating pregnancy history, tracking patient flow between departments, scanning and uploading results from tablets, and recovering patient data that was not immediately visible. Her skill touches nearly every step of the patient-flow process, making her one of SERHA’s most knowledgeable EHR operators.
But what truly elevates Sophia is not only what she learned, but how she shared it. Her expertise quickly became a resource for her facility, then the wider SERHA region. She supported staff across multiple facilities, solving problems, building confidence, and offering practical guidance whenever challenges arose. She also led a monthly Change Champion Circle, teaching workarounds, demonstrating advanced system features, and empowering other change agents. Through this medium her leadership reached beyond SERHA as she shared her knowledge with staff from other regions as well, strengthening Jamaica’s wider EHR rollout.
Sophia also plays a key role as a liaison and advocate with the EHR team, working closely with Dr. Hines and Dr. Barwise to improve system usability. She regularly identifies issues, recommends enhancements, and provides real-time feedback based on her deep understanding of how staff actually interact with the system. Her insights have informed better workflows, improved consistency, and helped shape refinements that benefit users across the health service. She has become one of the EHR team’s most reliable feedback partners, able to translate user challenges into clear, practical recommendations for improvement.
Her journey highlights a powerful truth: technology alone does not transform a health system; it is the people who do. For the EHR, and the wider Health System Strengthening Programme (HSSP), to succeed and remain sustainable, Jamaica needs champions who step up, buy in, change their behaviours, demonstrate ownership, support others, and commit to continuous improvement. Sophia is one of those champions. She reminds us that the sustainability of the EHR depends on people who understand that every clean data entry, every correction, every solved problem, and every shared skill contributes to improved patient care and a stronger, more resilient health system.
Within SERHA, Sophia is known as the one who “figures it out,” the person who “makes the EHR make sense,” and the “change champion we didn’t know we needed.” Her colleagues rely on her, her region celebrates her, other regions learn from her, and the national rollout is stronger because of her contributions. She is not just an Electronic Records Technician; she is a trailblazer, a teacher, an advocate, and one of the brightest examples of what true change leadership looks like.
And she is just getting started.
Asked what keeps her motivated, Sophia smiles with the kind of quiet confidence that only comes from mastery. “The system is powerful, more powerful than most people realize,” she says. “Every day I find something new that makes the work easier, faster, or more accurate. I know there are still hidden gems in there, and I can’t wait to discover them. The more we learn it, the stronger our healthcare system becomes.”
For Sophia, the EHR is not just a tool, it is a world of possibility. And with her passion, curiosity, and leadership, that world will only continue to expand.
As Jamaica continues to expand the EHR nationally, it will be champions like Sophia Lothan who make the system sustainable, effective, and transformative. Her leadership, quiet yet powerful, proves that meaningful change happens when people lean in with curiosity, courage, and commitment.
By Cordell Williams-Graham
Change Management Specialist, HSSP