Dr. Prescott Winter
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OPM plans to release statement on retirement
HHS issues new proposal for health records
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Symantec CEO, Enrique Salem, says company is working with feds on Aurora attacks
Facebook leak thwarts Israeli military operation
Joshua Seidman, PhD
On the HHS’ Health IT Buzz blog, Dr. Joshua Seidman writes about the Regional Extension Centers announced February 12th, and their upcoming expansion. “In the coming weeks, ONC will be rolling out more components of our HIT Extension Program. In particular, we’ll keep you apprised of our plans for the HIT Research Center (HITRC) that will help provide support and continuity to the RECs and create a virtual community of shared learning.”
Seidman says that Regional Extension Centers, local centers to enable smaller, primary-care physician practices to adopt health IT, will serve “every nook and cranny of the country, and that “additional REC cooperative agreements will be announced in the near future.” The grants will be “focused on solo and small group practices, community and rural health centers, public and critical-access hospitals, and other settings that predominately serve uninsured, underinsured, or medically underserved patients.”
Priorities for HHS dollars include:
Seidman writes about meaningful use, “We know that simply doing the wrong thing faster won’t improve the care delivery system. Meaningful use of EHRs requires important changes that will result in a better, more convenient and efficient care delivery system for clinicians and patients.”
Keep these priorities in mind when looking for health IT grants that your business is positioned to compete for: the White House’s priorities of expanding health care coverage and job creation carries over to health IT.
Call it serendipity. It was Fall 2008, and Melissa Chapman was attending a healthcare IT conference. Featured was a new technology that allowed a diverse set of healthcare organizations — including the VA, Social Security Administration, MedVirginia and the Indian Health Service — to securely share vital health information on-demand. Chapman was thrilled. The Federal Health Architecture program she had initiated had come a long way since she left HHS as CIO in 2003. She quickly asked: “How can I get involved with this again?” It wasn’t long before Chapman joined Agilex, a key developer of the technology, as vice president of health solutions.
On the heels of her new role, Chapman recently spoke with ExecutiveBiz about her plans to help this rapidly growing company, which has generated $20 million in healthcare IT alone over the last two years, continue its ascent as a significant player in the arena.
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$20 Billion in UK healthcare IT spending for Google or Microsoft? In the UK, Conservative Party leader David Cameron has made it clear that he wants to scrap the Labour Party government’s “centrally determined and unresponsive” plan for a $20 billion national health data network, in favor of Google Health or Microsoft HealthVault, according to the Daily Mail. While Google is the “front runner” and David Cameron’s top adviser is married to Google’s VP of Public Sector Relations in Britain, Rachel Whetstone, Microsoft has made significant headway in the US. Microsoft recently launched a pilot electronic health record (EHR) program with Kaiser Permanente, the largest managed care organization in the US, and recently partnered with iGuard, a nonprofit online initiative to track prescription drug interactions. With $800 million of the Department of Veterans Affairs’ health IT budget allocated for new programs, competition for the growing US public-sector health IT marketplace is going to be fierce. Click here to read more.
Tony Zinni
Last week, Tony Zinni told the Wall Street Journal that BAE was seeking “Smart Power” contracts, favoring infrastructure over expensive weapons systems likely to be culled from the DoD’s budget. This week, we saw several big infrastructure awards:
