GAO Appoints Seven New Members to Health IT Advisory Committee

Gene L. Dodaro, Comptroller General of the United States and head of the US Government Accountability Office (GAO), has announced the appointment of seven members to the Health IT Advisory Committee (HITAC).

“Today’s appointees bring impressive qualifications and a range of experiences and perspectives to the HITAC’s work on such issues as the use of technology to promote care coordination, addressing the needs of children and other vulnerable populations, and supporting public health,” Dodaro said.

“These new additions, along with the existing members, will be a key source of advice for advancing the electronic access, exchange, and use of health information, as outlined in the 21st Century Cures Act,” Dodaro continued.

The newly appointed members are Hans Buitendijk, Steven Eichner, Rajesh Godavarthi, Hung Luu, Aaron Neinstein, Eliel Oliveira, and Fillipe Southerland. Each member is appointed for a three-year term and may be reappointed for subsequent three-year terms.

The 21st Century Cures Act, passed in December 2016, established HITAC and gave the Comptroller General responsibility for appointing at least 14 of the members. The legislation also tasked the Secretary of Health & Human Services, the Majority and Minority leaders of the Senate, and the Speaker and Minority Leader of the House of Representatives with appointing 11 members to HITAC.

The committee provides recommendations to the National Coordinator for Health IT on policies, standards, implementation specifications, and certification criteria related to the implementation of a health IT infrastructure that advances interoperability.

Hans J. Buitendijk, MSc, is director of interoperability strategy at EHR vendor Cerner, with a primary focus on establishing and propagating industry standards to support interoperability across health IT systems. Buitendijk represents Cerner in various interoperability initiatives, such as HL7, CommonWell Health Alliance, Carequality Interoperability Framework, and The Sequoia Project.

Steven Eichner, MPA, is the health IT lead at the Texas Department of State Health Services. Eichner has focused on projects to improve the state’s ability to collect, manage, and exchange key public health data. He has also engaged in the development of data standards, such as the United States Core Data for Interoperability and the HL7 Situational Awareness for Novel Epidemic Response standard.

Rajesh Godavarthi, MS, is the associate vice president of technology and interoperability at MCG Health, where he is responsible for their technology roadmap and interoperability strategy. Godavarthi is also an active collaborator in the HL7 Da Vinci Project, focused on data standardization for value-based care programs.  

Hung S. Luu, PharmD, MD, is the director of clinical pathology at Children’s Health, a health system with hospitals in Plano and Dallas, Texas. Luu is also an associate professor of pathology at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

He serves as the co-chair of the implementation committee for the Food and Drug Administration’s SHIELD initiative, a multi-stakeholder initiative to improve the quality, interoperability, and portability of laboratory data. Additionally, Luu is an active member of the informatics and standards committees at the College of American Pathologists.

Aaron Neinstein, MD, is the vice president of Digital Health at University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Health, senior director at the UCSF Center for Digital Health Innovation, and associate professor of medicine at UCSF. He has led the development and implementation of a wide range of health IT, with a focus on boosting patient access and engagement through telehealth and remote patient monitoring.

Eliel Oliveira, MBA, MS, is director of research and innovation, at the Dell Medical School of the University of Texas at Austin. Oliveira also provides executive leadership to the Central Texas health information exchange.

He has helped lead the development of a mobile patient engagement platform—with a focus on involving underrepresented populations in the design process—and a community-wide referral management platform that integrates social services referrals, clinical data, and personal needs assessments.

Fillipe Southerland is the director of healthcare solutions at Yardi Systems, Inc., one of the nation’s largest health IT developers serving long-term and post-acute care providers, and is a member of Choctaw Nation. Southerland is an active participant in Carequality Interoperability Framework, where he concentrates on connecting long-term and post-acute health care providers to the framework.