About Us

Dr. Wendy Arafiles has been a practicing pediatric hospitalist at Phoenix Children’s for over 15 years with a specific interest in children with medical complexity and technology dependence. 

She has also filled the role of medical director of the Clinical Documentation Integrity (CDI) program since 2018. In her dual roles, she is intertwining skills in medical education, innovations in quality improvement for children with medical complexity, and foundational understanding of hospital finance.

Her goals are to optimize the institution’s ability to describe the complexity of the patient population and develop high-value programs in patient and family service. Dr. Arafiles has presented on both CDI and Medical Complexity topics at several national conferences, and she is an active member of the Pediatric Documentation Research Collaborative, a research group that focuses on documentation-related issues in pediatric hospitals.

Matthew Baker, MD, is a critical care physician at Children’s Hospital Colorado. He received his medical degree from George Washington School of Medicine in Washington DC, and then completed pediatric residency training and a chief resident year at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.

Dr. Baker is actively involved in medical education to medical students, interns, residents, and fellows. He has lectured extensively on a variety of pediatric topics involving outpatient and inpatient pediatrics.

He has been involved in several quality improvement initiatives including targeting overuse of oseltamivir in the emergency department setting and preventing delirium in the pediatric critical care unit.

His current research interests involve hospital resource utilization and optimization, specifically how resource strain caused by shifts in patient volumes and acuity impact healthcare outcomes. These projects and others have been presented at conferences across the country including Pediatric Academic Societies and American Academy of Pediatrics and have also been published in Peds in Review and other peer-reviewed publications.

As for his administrative pursuits, he hopes to expand pediatric critical care resource availability to rural communities across the country through the use of real-time telemedicine consultation and offshoot ICU development.

Sheldon Berkowitz, MD, FAAP has recently retired after a 38-year career as a Pediatrician (having done both Primary Care and Hospitalist work) and an 8-year career as Medical Director (Physician Advisor) for Case Management, Utilization Management, and Clinical Documentation Improvement (CDI) at Children’s Minnesota, which is a free-standing, tertiary children’s hospital serving the upper Midwest. He had worked at Children’s since 2001 and in July 2014 was asked to be Children’s first Physician Advisor and to help develop the program.

In his role as Medical Director (name change in 2016 to reflect the broader responsibilities in the job), he supported the hospital’s inpatient case managers in assessing admission status as well as assisting in discharge planning when barriers were encountered. In addition, he handled all insurance denials for inpatient status or lack of medical necessity and was successful in getting the majority of those overturned. He also supported the CDI department in getting clinicians to answer documentation queries as well as helping to develop documentation guidelines (e.g. Acute Respiratory Failure and Malnutrition). Finally, he co-chaired the Utilization Management Committee as it oversaw all issues of utilization.

Dr. Berkowitz has lectured nationally on various topics dealing with case management and CDI. He is also a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Minnesota.

Dr. Berkowitz has a long-standing interest in Bioethics and was a member of the hospital’s Ethics committee for over 34 years and has written and lectured on various Ethics topics both locally and nationally. Dr. Berkowitz is the Past President of the Minnesota Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Amy Bush, BS, RN, MJ, CCDS, CCS, is currently serving as a Pediatric/Neonatal Inpatient CDIS III at Cooper University Hospital in Camden, New Jersey, following the successful creation of a pediatric CDI program within a larger adult institution 5 years ago. This endeavor followed a 20-year career at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where she held numerous positions in CDI, PICU Case Management, Bed Management-Patient Flow, and Cardiac Center Clinical Coordinator.

Amy has also held positions as a Nurse Advocate, Regulatory Affairs Associate and Compliance Officer, Director of Admissions and Case Management, and Clinical Nursing in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit.

She obtained her B.S. in Nursing at The Pennsylvania State University in 1994 and a Master of Jurisprudence in Health Law at Widener University School of Law in 2001. Amy has presented in various venues on a variety of topics and served as a guest lecturer at two universities.

Currently, Amy is serving her 3rd year in a co-leadership role in APDIS (Association of Pediatric Documentation Improvement Specialists), a national networking group under the direction of ACDIS, and on the ACDIS Chapter Advisory Board. Amy is dual-certified in CDI and coding.

Douglas Carlson, MD is the Chair and Professor of Pediatrics at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine and the Medical Director of HSHS St. John’s Children’s Hospital. He is board-certified in Pediatric Hospital Medicine and Pediatric Emergency Medicine. Dr. Carlson has established and improved pediatric hospital medicine programs in a large children’s hospital, in community hospitals and currently in a children’s hospital within a large general hospital. He has worked in both academic and nonacademic environments.  He was previously the Associate CMO for Patient Safety and Clinical Quality at St. Louis Children’s Hospital.

Dr. Carlson has extensive experience in developing care delivery systems. His experience as both a pediatric emergency physician and pediatric hospitalist helps develop an insight on delivering effective, safe, equitable, efficient, timely and family centered care from an ED visit or direct admission through discharge planning. Dr. Carlson has provided consultative services in many types of delivery systems, including newborn care.

Dr. Carlson is recognized internationally for his work in developing pediatric sedation programs. He is a founding member of the International Committee for the Advancement of Procedural Sedation. Dr. Carlson has worked with many types of hospitals in developing pediatric sedation programs including skill development, maintenance of skills and credentialing of providers.

Dr. Daxa Clarke is the Chief Medical Information Officer and a Pediatric Hospitalist at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. As the CMIO, she is involved in projects that leverage IT resources to affect change in physician workflows, clinical documentation, utilization management, patient safety, and quality.

Previously, she was the Medical Director for Clinical Documentation Improvement/Utilization Management (CDI/UM) at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. As Medical Director of CDI, Dr. Clarke has provided education to medical staff and house officers on CDI, DRGs, CC/MCCs, SOI changes, audits, and denial management. She led the hospital’s efforts for continuous monitoring for CDI queries using programming logic. She developed several documentation guidelines, leading change in the hospital’s diagnosis capture rates. In these endeavors, she has engaged the medical staff in transforming clinical documentation and developed recognition programs to reinforce positive change.

As Medical Director of UM, Dr. Clarke has been involved in medical necessity assignments, peer-to-peer discussions and appeals, and overall length of stay management and utilization review.  She chaired the Utilization Management Review Committee for the hospital.  She has been involved in all levels of denial management related to level of care assignments and DRG assignments, including active involvement in contract discussions. She has been involved in the redesign of the hospital’s Call Center, helping to create workflows for the acceptance of patients from outlying clinics and EDs, admissions from PCP offices, transfers from outside hospitals needing higher level of care, and admissions internally from the hospital’s ED.

Dr. Clarke is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Arizona College of Medicine—Phoenix and continues to practice as a pediatric hospitalist. She has previously served as the Clerkship Director for Pediatrics for the medical school. She also developed, and previously led, the Fellowship Program for Pediatric Hospital Medicine at Phoenix Children’s Hospital.  She is board certified in Pediatrics, Pediatric Hospital Medicine, and Clinical Informatics.

Heather Collette, MD, MHS is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Yale School of Medicine and practices as a pediatric hospitalist at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital in Connecticut. She staffs at Yale’s academic and community hospital sites with clinical experience in neonatal resuscitation, newborn nursery, and inpatient pediatric medicine.

She holds a master’s degree in medical education with expertise in engaging learners using technology. She is the associate director for the pediatric hospital medicine fellowship at Yale.

Dr. Collette serves as a co-chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Community Pediatric Hospital Medicine Finance Committee and co-directs the Documentation Optimization, Coding and Compliance Committee for Yale’s Department of Pediatrics. She has been recognized as an expert in pediatric hospital medicine billing and coding and has lectured nationally on this topic. Her passion for medical billing is rooted in helping departments seek appropriate monetary reimbursement to support the important resources patients need to heal.

Denise M. Goodman, MD, MS, FCCM is a board-certified pediatric intensivist, Senior Physician Advisor, and Co-Chair, Utilization Review at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. In that role she has oversight of utilization management, denials management, and multiple operational initiatives including discharge efficiency, throughput, status determination, observation management, out-of-network processes, and prior authorization among others. She now leads a team of 4 other physician advisors focused on enterprise-wide process improvement aimed at providing effective, equitable, safe, family-centered care.

Dr. Goodman is also the inaugural chair of the Pediatric Committee of the American College of Physician Advisors, and is recognized as a leader in developing physician advisor programs in pediatrics.

Dr. Goodman is a Professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Clinically, Dr. Goodman is Medical Director of the Pulmonary Habilitation Program, a large clinical program for children receiving invasive home mechanical ventilation via tracheostomy. She continues to publish widely in the areas of critical care practice and in the care of children with medical complexity. She has previously been a fellowship program director both for the Lurie program and national chair of pediatric critical care fellowships.

Juliet B. Ugarte Hopkins, MD, is President of the American College of Physician Advisors (ACPA), CEO of Velvet Hammer Physician Advising, LLC, and a member of the MedLearn Media RACMonitor.com editorial board.

She worked as the first Physician Advisor for Case Management, Utilization, and Clinical Documentation at ProHealth Care, Inc., creating, cultivating, and optimizing the role at the three-hospital health system in southeastern Wisconsin and served as the first physician board member for the Wisconsin chapter of the American Case Management Association.

Clinically, Dr. Ugarte Hopkins trained at Advocate Lutheran General Children’s Hospital and then practiced as a pediatric hospitalist in a near-tertiary care center in Rockford, Illinois for a decade. While there, she was also the medical director of pediatric hospital medicine and vice chair of pediatrics before transitioning into the physician advisor role in Wisconsin.

She has made multiple appearances on the Monitor Monday and Talk Ten Tuesday webcasts via RACMonitor.com and ICD10Monitor.com, is a national speaker, including presentations at ACPA’s National Physician Advisor Conferences (NPAC), Association of Clinical Documentation Integrity Specialists (ACDIS) annual conferences, and Case Management Society of America (CMSA) annual conferences, and is a frequent author of articles involving topics related to the physician advisor scope of work.

Howard E. Jeffries, MD, MBA, is a Pediatric Cardiac Intensivist and the Senior Medical Director of the Regional Network at Seattle Children’s Hospital.  He has worked at Seattle Children’s since 2004 and has had multiple leadership roles that have spanned quality improvement, lean healthcare transformation, strategic planning, and the development of the Seattle Children’s Care Network.  In his current role, he leads Seattle Children’s clinical efforts across the states of Washington, Montana, Alaska, and Idaho.  This includes partnerships and affiliations with multiple hospital organizations across the region in which Seattle Children’s provides specialty care in neonatal intensive care units, pediatric hospital medicine wards as well as in ambulatory settings.  Patients outside of the Seattle area represent more than half of the annual clinical volume and revenue for Seattle Children’s.

He is board-certified in pediatrics and pediatric critical care medicine. He has edited textbooks on lean transformation in healthcare and has lectured and published in the areas of quality improvement and clinical transformation, quality metrics, cardiac intensive care, informatics, and outcomes assessment.

He is the co-founder of BlueBin, a healthcare supply chain consultancy.  BlueBin provides world-class supply chain solutions for healthcare institutions based on lean healthcare concepts.  Since its founding in 2011, BlueBin’s solutions have been implemented at more than 50 hospitals across the United States and are currently deploying supply chain analytics at more than 120 hospitals.

Kristen has over 20 years of experience in Coding and Clinical Documentation Integrity. During the first 12 years of her career, she focused on becoming a coding expert, and for the last 8 years, she has specialized in CDI (Clinical Documentation Integrity). She played a crucial role as a principal team member in implementing the documentation improvement program at a Pediatric facility. Additionally, she had the opportunity to educate the system during the ICD-10 implementation.

Furthermore, Kristen successfully implemented a highly effective pre-bill audit program, which involves a comprehensive review of diagnosis and procedure coding, POA (Present on Admission) status, and clinical validation before the bill drops.

Her expertise extends to providing support to physicians, coding, and CDI staff in reducing unnecessary complications, mortalities, and observed over expected statistics in both an acute care hospital and a stand-alone pediatric facility. Currently, she performs coding and CDI reviews and conducts audits, specializing in mortality, surgical complications, high-cost cases, low severity cases, short stays, and focused insurance denial daily reviews for clients.

Kristen earned her Bachelor of Science from Texas Woman’s University, solidifying her knowledge and qualifications in the field.

Deborah Liu, MD is currently Associate Division Director for the Division of Emergency Medicine at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA). She is board certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Emergency Medicine. Since joining CHLA in 2003, Dr. Liu has held multiple leadership roles, including Fellowship Director and Director of Process Improvement. In her current role, Dr. Liu oversees the clinical operations for the Emergency Department, which saw 85,000 visits in FY20.

Dr. Liu has collaborated with numerous groups throughout CHLA towards continuous process improvement efforts for the organization. Along with her colleagues and a large multidisciplinary group, Dr. Liu was the physician champion of the CHLA ED Redesign Initiative in 2016, which transformed ED throughput metrics, quality of care, and education for our resident physicians without adding any additional resources.

In addition, Dr. Liu has published numerous scholarly articles and textbook chapters on various topics in pediatric emergency medicine, has been elected to the Society for Pediatric Research, was an associate editor for a textbook, and has won several local, regional, and national awards. She also serves on the CHLA Medical Group Board of Directors, the CHLA Medical Executive Committee, and the Board of Directors of non-profit organizations.

Dr. Maskin is a board-certified pediatrician and board-eligible pediatric hospitalist who has been in practice at Children’s Hospital & Medical Center for 10 years. Since 2014, she has been the Medical Director of Inpatient Medical-Surgical Services and in that role has overseen clinical operations for 3 inpatient units.

Dr. Maskin has supported the leadership of the Division of Pediatric Hospital Medicine and served as the voice for this group on several hospital committees and institution-wide initiatives. She has also led development of an observation unit, redesigned use of inpatient space during COVID, adopted policies related to acute care, and helped to establish standards of care for numerous conditions and therapies.

Dr. Maskin played a key role during times of bed crisis in developing ways to improve throughout and optimize bed capacity. She has leadership and quality improvement training as well as extensive experience in leading multi-disciplinary teams.

Ameer P. Mody, MD, MPH, is a pediatric emergency physician, Associate Division Director, and Director of ED Clinical Informatics at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA). He is board-certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Emergency Medicine. He also holds a faculty position in the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California as an Associate Professor of Clinical Pediatrics.

In his roles, Dr. Mody has focused on utilizing data to create infrastructure for emergency department (ED) optimization. His projects have included the development of ideal staffing and scheduling models, integration of allied health providers into the ED care model, ED dashboard and KPI development, authoring and editing evidence-based protocols, and strategies to improve revenue capture. He most recently championed the integration of telehealth services into the workflow of the ED.

Dr. Mody has lectured extensively, authored numerous textbook chapters and scholarly articles on a variety of topics in pediatric emergency medicine. He serves on the Chapter 9 American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Injury and Violence Prevention. He has been awarded the CHLA Resident Teaching Award, twice nominated for the CHLA Humanism Award, and received the American Academy of Pediatrics local chapter Young Pediatrician of the Year Award.

Dr. Paciorkowski is a pediatric hospitalist and the Medical Director of the Pediatric Hospital Service at Rochester General Hospital, in Rochester NY. She is also a member of the Pediatric Hospitalist Division of the University of Rochester Medical Center. Dr. Paciorkowski provides patient care as well as resident education at Rochester General and Golisano Children’s hospitals. She also leads the development of all clinical and operational pediatric policies and processes at Rochester General Hospital.

Since 2014 Dr. Paciorkowski has been serving as a physician advisor for Rochester General and affiliated hospitals.  In her role as a pediatric physician advisor in a general hospital, Dr. Paciorkowski reviews pediatric and neonatal hospitalizations for level of care determination (inpatient vs. observation status) and medical necessity of the hospital stay. She provides support and education for utilization review nurses and the coding team on pediatric and neonatal cases. Dr. Paciorkowski also manages all pediatric and neonatal denials for the Rochester Regional Health System, including medical necessity, level of care, and DRG/diagnoses denials, where she does all the peer-to-peer reviews as well as all levels of appeals.

In addition to her pediatric physician advisor work, Dr. Paciorkowski also works as part of a large general physician advisor group, reviewing adult medical and surgical hospitalizations for appropriateness of inpatient vs. observation status and supporting the utilization review team.

Dr. Paciorkowski has presented nationally on various topics, including patient status determination, the role of pediatric physician advisor, and denial management. She has also been involved in multiple collaborative projects through the Section of Hospital Medicine of the AAP, leading her hospital efforts in pediatric research and quality improvement and presenting at national meetings.

Amy Sanderson, MD is a pediatric intensivist and has a faculty appointment at Harvard Medical School as an assistant professor in Anaesthesia. She is board certified in Pediatrics, Pediatric Critical Care and Internal Medicine.

Dr. Sanderson has been the Physician Advisor for the Clinical Documentation Integrity (CDI) Program at Boston Children’s Hospital since its inception in 2014. She is a resource to physicians regarding coding guidelines and diagnosis terminology in order to improve the accuracy of final code assignment. Dr. Sanderson has led the effort to develop a set of guidelines representing a glossary of underutilized diagnostic terms and has contributed to the creation of numerous CDI tips that are distributed to all prescribers in the hospital. In her role as Physician Advisor, she works collaboratively with various key individuals and departments throughout the hospital including hospital leadership, the health information department and case management.

Dr. Sanderson has presented at several national conferences and has published scholarly articles on a variety of topics including palliative care and documentation. She has been involved with the Association of Clinical Documentation Integrity Specialists (ACDIS) by giving clinical and research webinars, presenting clinical topics at ACDIS’ pediatric networking group meetings, contributing to the book Pediatric CDI: Building Blocks for Success, publishing articles in ACDIS’ CDI Journal and presenting at their national conference. In addition, Dr. Sanderson is a founding member of the Pediatric Documentation Research Collaborative, a research group that focuses on documentation-related issues in pediatric hospitals.

Samir S. Shah, MD, MSCE, is Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. He is Vice Chair of Clinical Affairs and Education and holds the James M. Ewell Endowed Chair. He is board-certified in pediatrics, pediatric infectious diseases, and pediatric hospital medicine. Clinically, he practices both Pediatric Hospital Medicine and Pediatric Infectious Diseases.

Dr. Shah’s research, which includes developing quality measures for inpatient care, has improved the efficiency and effectiveness of care for hospitalized children. His work has been supported by numerous federal agencies and foundations, including the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Dr. Shah also serves as Editor-in-Chief for the Journal of Hospital Medicine.

As the inaugural director of Cincinnati Children’s Division of Hospital Medicine (2012-2022), Dr. Shah led the development of new clinical programs focusing on children with medical complexity and adults requiring care at the children’s hospital, as well as the creation of sustainable models for inpatient staffing. In 2019, he received the Master of Hospital Medicine, the Society of Hospital Medicine’s highest honor, for his substantive contributions to the development of hospital medicine as an academic discipline.

Jorde Spitler, BSN, RN, CCDS, is the Clinical Documentation Integrity Program Manager at Dayton Children’s Hospital. He has led the CDI program since its inception in 2017, achieving a remarkable 99% query response rate. Jorde has extensive experience in reviewing multiple specialties, including NICU, PICU, and Heme/Onc. He is known for his data-driven approach and has a wealth of experience in customizing dashboards and reports from the EMR. Additionally, Jorde is well-versed in dealing with insurance denials and is actively involved in writing appeals. He is passionate about educating providers and coding staff on the significance of comprehensive clinical documentation. Since 2021, Jorde has been a valuable member of the ACDIS Leadership Council.

With nearly 16 years of experience at Dayton Children’s, Jorde has worked in various nursing settings, including NICU, PICU, Emergency Room, Heme/Onc, Specialty Pediatrics, Outpatient Surgery, and Transport. He continues to work PRN in the ER at Dayton Children’s to maintain his clinical skills and build strong relationships with the providers.

Recently, Jorde spearheaded a problem-list initiative, focusing on the utilization and accuracy of the problem-list. He remains actively involved in assisting with problem-list initiatives at his organization. Currently, he is engaged in a project that involves reviewing Inpatient Behavioral Health encounters to ensure appropriate DRG assignments.

Lisa is a strategic, bold, and quality-driven leader with over 20 years of nursing experience, 12 of which have been in progressive leadership roles. In 2014, she joined a leading children’s hospital where she spent 5 years dedicated to quality and leadership support for their world-renowned Transplant program. In 2019, she transitioned to the role of Assistant Director of Care Coordination.

Since 2019, Lisa has successfully led several initiatives that significantly improved efficiency and the patient experience for both patients and team members. Her accomplishments include the development of a Predictive Analytics Readmission Model, resulting in a reduction of readmissions by 1.2% and a decrease in length of stay by 12%. Additionally, she created service line-based teams and achieved many other noteworthy achievements. Her passion for team development, quality, efficient care and workflows, and ensuring patients receive the right care at the right time at the right cost is evident in her exceptional leadership.

In recognition of her dedication and contributions, Lisa has been promoted to the role of Director of Care Coordination and Utilization Management in 2023.

Lisa earned her Master’s in Nursing Administration from UT Arlington in 2012 and recently completed her Doctorate of Nursing Practice in Administration in 2023 from UTHealth Cizik School of Nursing. Her extensive educational background combined with her experience in women and children’s services make her a knowledgeable and committed leader for our service.

Michael J. Steiner, MD, MPH is a general pediatrician and pediatric hospitalist and serves as the Pediatrician in Chief at University of North Carolina (UNC) Children’s Hospital. He’s also the Vice-Chair of Clinical Affairs for the Department of Pediatrics. 

He has worked at UNC since 2006 and served across a number of leadership positions and roles in clinical administration, academic administration and as the medical director for children’s population health. He currently works as an Associate Dean for Outreach Initiatives helping to facilitate a major affiliation between UNC and another healthcare entity. 

His areas of professional and administrative interest include health care delivery structures, professional billing and reimbursement, and developing contractual relationships to establish systems of care for children in local communities. His academic interests include evaluating systems of care for children with medical complexity and other health services questions.

Christine White, MD, MAT, is Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Hospital Medicine and the Chief Capacity, Flow and Access Officer at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

Dr. White is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Medicine. She completed her pediatrics residency and chief residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. Dr. White’s interests and research focus on quality improvement with an expertise in the application of quality improvement sciences to improve inpatient systems of care.

Dr. White has led efforts on patient safety, including initiatives to raise rates of medication reconciliation completion, to improve communication at night, and to improve discharge efficiency through standardization of discharge criteria. This last project, which significantly decreased length of stay without increasing readmission rates, earned the Children’s Hospital Association Pediatric Quality Award in 2013.

Since 2016, she has served on the Faculty for the Institute of Healthcare Improvement with a focus on patient flow. In 2020, she was recognized for her significant achievements in quality improvement and patient safety with the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Quality and Patient Safety Award.