For the first time, CompTIA’s monthly Human Services IT Advisory Group (HSITAG) meeting on April 4 teamed up with a widely attended industry conference, the Healthcare IT Connect Summit in Baltimore, MD.
HSITAG hosted a session on industry collaboration featuring CMS’ Director of State Systems Marty Rice and the CIO of West Virginia’s Department of Health and Human Services Ed Dolly. The first exciting announcement was that Julie Boughn has accepted the CMS position of Director of Data and Systems Group, a position vacated by Jessica Kahn late last year. Julie has held this position in the past and is a well-respected selection for the job; HSITAG members are pleased with the appointment.
Both Marty and Ed emphasized the importance of reuse and collaboration between states, and the role that industry can play in encouraging system and module reuse among MMIS projects from one state to the next. Marty explained that CMS is working on open-source coding to make up the basis of a module that they will encourage all states to adopt as a basis for their systems.
Concerns and questions from the audience centered around states working off of overly prescriptive requirements in procurements, forcing systems that may be reusable to be so customized that you land in a place where no system is the same.
Marty and Ed emphasized that reuse and collaboration was the goal of the future of MMIS and so industry will continue to encourage this through their offerings and CMS will continue to encourage it through the Advance Planning Document (APD) approval processes and guidance.
Jennifer Saha is the National Director, Public Sector Councils at CompTIA
