About the Author

JIM DEMARCO is Director of Application Development at the Hudson Center for Health Equity and Quality (HCHEQ), in Tarrytown, NY. HCHEQ is a not-for-profit organization whose mission includes advocacy for equitable healthcare policy in government and the development of information technologies to improve healthcare quality, safety, and efficiency. Previously, Jim was a product manager at Sharp Electronics, where his responsibilities included the development of their handheld organizer product line.

Jim has been building Microsoft Office applications ever since he first received a copy of Microsoft Access 1 in the early 1990s. He discovered object-oriented programming when taking a Visual Basic 5 course, and has been a strong proponent of that paradigm ever since. Jim has published numerous articles on this subject and has also published articles on Microsoft Access programming. He has worked as a software trainer for local adult education facilities, a position that has helped tremendously when designing user interfaces.

Jim is currently leading a team of developers using cutting-edge .NET technologies to streamline the processing of Medicaid applications in New York state. He is the software architect for a system that streamlines that process, providing huge cost savings to all users of the system, as well as providing data efficiencies.

Jim is also a working musician and music producer; music from his projects is available locally and nationally.