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New Health IT Policy and Standards Committees’ Workgroups Help ONC Achieve Goals

Jodi G. Daniel | August 4, 2014

As part of our efforts to streamline the work of the Federal Advisory Committees (FACAs) (the Health IT Policy Committee (HITPC) and Health IT Standards Committee (HITSC)) and their workgroups, we have been taking steps to make sure that their work aligns with our strategic direction and our policy priorities. 

Thanks to the work of the FACAs and their workgroups, we have seen significant improvement in the adoption and use of certified electronic health record technology. It’s through their hard work that we’ve been able to better support collaboration across the entire health IT and health care communities. We expect those collaborative efforts to continue to build diverse perspectives into the future.

The realignment establishes the following Health IT Policy Committee Workgroups:

  • Health IT Strategic Planning and Innovation
    • Chair: David Lansky
    • Co-chair: Jennifer Covich
  • Health IT Implementation, Usability and Safety
    • Chair: David Bates
    • Co-chair: Larry Wolf
  • Interoperability and Health Information Exchange 
    • Chair: Micky Tripathi
    • Co-chair: Chris Lehmann
  • Advanced Health Models and Meaningful Use
    • Chair: Paul Tang
    • Co-chair: Joe Kimura
  • Privacy and Security
    • Chair: Deven McGraw
    • Co-chair: Stanley Crosley
  • Consumer Perspective and Engagement
    • Chair: Christine Bechtel
    • Co-chair: Neil Calman

Health IT Standards Committee Workgroups and Chairs:

  • Steering Committee
    • Chair: Jacob Reider
    • Co-chair: John Halamka
  • Semantics and Standards
    • Co-chair: Jamie Ferguson
    • Co-chair: Becky Kush
  • Implementation, Certification and Testing
    • Co-chair: Liz Johnson
    • Co-chair: Cris Ross
  • Architecture, Services, and Application Programming Interfaces (APIs)
    • Chair: David McCallie
    • Co-chair: Arien Malec
  • Content Standards
    • Chair: Andy Wiesenthal
    • Co-chair: Rich Elmore
  • Transport and Security
    • Chair:  Dixie Baker
    • Co-chair:  Lisa Gallagher

We are looking forward to working closely with the members of the new workgroups. Depending on the scope and charge of the work being requested, we know there may be some circumstances when we will need to establish task forces or subgroups to support their work. The following two groups have recently been established in this vein to provide rapid feedback to ONC:

  • JASON Task Force: The JASON task force is a short term joint HITPC and HITSC task force established to analyze and synthesize feedback on the JASON report
    • Policy co-chair:  Micky Tripathi
    • Standards co-chair: David McCallie
  • Interoperability and Health Information Exchange – Governance Subgroup:  This subgroup was established to identify the substance, scope, and process for the development of “rules of the road” needed for information to flow efficiently across networks
    • Co-chair: Chris Lehmann
    • Co-chair: Carol Robinson

We are pleased by the commitment and the hard work that all of our HITPC, HITSC and workgroup members are doing to help improve the health and health care of everyone in the U.S. It is their expertise and knowledge that guides those of us at ONC down the path to interoperability, and better health and care for all patients.