The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) aims to play a bigger role in health tech modernization efforts, including leading interoperability initiatives.
The agency created a new Office of Health Technology and Products (OHTP) to provide "enterprise leadership and oversight for CMS healthcare technology modernization, digital products and transformation of platforms and services supporting Medicare, Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and other CMS-administered programs," according to a notice in the Federal Register published on June 11.
The new health tech-focused office will work in close coordination with the CMS Chief Information Officer (CIO) and will lead enterprise strategy for artificial intelligence, interoperability, digital product development, Medicare.gov, provider directories and claims system modernization, according to the notice.
The office consists of eight divisions and the notice lists more than 90 responsibilities.
In March, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) narrowed the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology's responsibilities when it reversed a Biden-era tech reorganization of the department's technology functions. With that revamp, the department's health IT policy arm was returned to its original name, ONC. Under the Biden administration, ONC's name was changed to the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy/Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT.
With the change, three HHS-wide technology roles—Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer (CAIO), and Chief Data Officer (CDO)—moved back under the HHS Chief Information Officer’s leadership.
The new structure reinforces Office of the Chief Information Officer's statutory responsibility for enterprise IT, cybersecurity and data operations, while enabling ONC to concentrate on health IT policy, standards and certification that support better care and lower costs, according to HHS.
The creation of the new health tech office signals a shift with CMS leading interoperability and other tech initiatives, noted Jodi Daniel, a former director of ONC's office of policy.
"Sometimes these organizational changes are just administrative, but the creation of new office with almost 100 listed responsibilities (and almost 4 full pages in the Federal Register!) shows a significant shift in expectations and responsibilities!," Daniels wrote in a LinkedIn post.