Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Tapped to Head HHS. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has been named by President-Elect Donald Trump to be Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Kennedy would oversee the nation’s health policy, including Medicare and Medicaid, Health IT, and other areas of health care.

CMS OBRHI Renamed, Will Host Virtual Event Dec. 12. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Office of Burden Reduction and Health Informatics (OBRHI) is now the Office of Healthcare Experience and Interoperability (OHEI). CMS states it will continue to lead efforts to enhance an integrated healthcare delivery system that is informed by and responsive to patients, the health care workforce, and CMS program beneficiaries. It seeks to work with industry to improve health care delivery, population health, and the wellbeing of the health care workforce through policy development, technology, and public engagement to enable an effective health care delivery system centered on the experience of its customers. The agency envisions a health care system that functions seamlessly and equitably, delivering safe, high-quality care and improving overall health outcomes. OHEI is hosting the 2024 CMS Optimizing Healthcare Delivery to Improve Patient Lives Conference! The virtual event will take place Dec. 12, 2024, from 11:00 am to 4 pm ET. Go here to learn more about the event and to register.

ASTP ONC Publishes Real World Testing Plan Template. The Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy, Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ASTP ONC) has published its Real World Testing Plan Template. As a requirement of the ONC Health IT Certification Program, Health IT developers are required to conduct annual Real World Testing of their Certified Health IT. The Certification Program has released a new resource, the Real World Testing Plan Template, that will assist health IT developers in creating their Real World Testing plans. For more information on the Real World Testing requirements, developers are encouraged to review the other Real World Testing resources:

• Real World Testing–What It Means for Health IT Developers – Fact Sheet
• Real World Testing Resource Guide
• Real World Testing Certification Companion Guide

CMS to Hold Leadership National Call Wednesday Nov. 20. The Administrator of CMS, Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, and her leadership team, will discuss CMS’ accomplishments and express their appreciation to industry partners for helping them implement the agency’s Strategic Plan and key initiatives over the past several years. The national call will take place Wednesday, November 20, 2024 from 2 – 3 pm ET. Go here to RSVP.

CMS Soliciting Nominations for New Federal Health Equity Advisory Committee. CMS is establishing a new federal advisory committee, the Health Equity Advisory Committee (HEAC). The committee has been announced in the federal register to notify the public of its establishment and the nomination process for membership on the committee. Go here to view the Federal Register notice.

The Committee is established to advise and make recommendations to CMS on the identification and resolution of systemic barriers to accessing CMS programs that hinder quality of care for beneficiaries and consumers. The Committee will also serve as a dedicated platform for CMS collaboration with key interested persons to advance health equity by identifying how CMS can promote quality and access for beneficiaries of all CMS programs.  The Committee will focus on health disparities in underserved communities, which are populations sharing a particular characteristic, as well as geographic communities, that have been systematically denied a full opportunity to participate in aspects of economic, social, and civic life, such as but not limited to Black, Latino, and Indigenous and Native American persons, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and other persons of color; members of religious minorities; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) persons; persons with disabilities; persons who live in rural areas; and persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality as defined in Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government.

The Committee will consist of 20-30 individuals who will serve at least a 2-year term. These members should have experience working with underserved communities which are populations sharing a particular characteristic, as well as geographic communities, that have been systematically denied a full opportunity to participate in aspects of economic, social, and civic life, such as but not limited to Black, Latino, and Indigenous and Native American persons, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and other persons of color; members of religious minorities; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) persons; persons with disabilities; persons who live in rural areas; and persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality as defined in Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government.

Members should be knowledgeable in the fields of health equity; outreach to underserved populations; community/safety net providers; disability policy and access; and other relevant health equity matters that are presented or addressed by the agency. The Committee may also be comprised of Special Government Employees and Representative Members.  A Chair and Co-Chair will be appointed from the members. CMS must receive all the nomination information at the email address HEAC@cms.hhs.gov by December 12, 2024.

Each nomination must include the following information:

• A letter of nomination that contains contact information for both the nominator and nominee. One-page maximum.
• A statement from the nominee that they are willing to serve on the HEAC for at least a 2-year time period and an explanation of interest in serving on the HEAC. The nominee should also indicate which category or categories of underserved communities specified in section II.B their expertise can represent.  One-page maximum.
• A resumé or curriculum vitae that indicates the nominee's educational experience and relevant professional and/or lived experience. There is a two-page maximum.
• Two letters of reference that support the nominee's qualifications for participation in the HEAC and how their educational, professional, and/or lived experience aligns with at least one or more of the 5 priority areas within the CMS Framework for Health Equity or one or more of the 6 priority areas within the CMS Framework for Advancing Health Care in Rural, Tribal and Geographically Isolated Communities. Please choose only one framework to align the nominee’s experience with a CMS priority area.  One-page maximum per letter.

For more information, please visit the HEAC webpage

CISA Launches New Portal to Improve Cyber Reporting. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) transferred its cyber incident reporting form to the new CISA Services Portal, which offers enhanced features like secure login, the ability to save and update reports, share them with others, and search/filter reports. The portal also includes a new collaboration feature for informal discussions with CISA. To assist those reporting, CISA also released a resource outlining the reporting process and additional resources for reducing cyber risk. Health care organizations are encouraged to use the new portal for voluntary reporting of cyber incidents.

NIST Establishes AI Safety Research Agreements. The National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) AI Safety Institute announced a set of collaborative agreements with industry pertaining to artificial intelligence (AI) safety research. The agreements will enable collaborative research on how to evaluate capabilities and safety risks, as well as methods to mitigate those risks. Under these agreements, NIST formalized a collaboration with Anthropic and OpenAI. that will foster AI safety, testing, and evaluation. Evaluations conducted pursuant to these agreements will assist in advancing the safe, secure and trustworthy development and use of AI by building on the Administration’s Executive Order on AI and the voluntary commitments made to the administration by leading AI model developer. Go here to learn more about the AI Safety Institute.

Study: Telehealth Can Reduce Office-Based Low Value Care. In an article published in JAMA Network Open titled “Primary Care Practice Telehealth Use and Low-Value Care Services,” researchers examined practice-level telehealth use associated with the rates of low-value care services in primary care. This retrospective cohort study, with 577, 928 participants, used a difference-in-differences study design and was conducted from Jan. 1, 2019, to Dec. 31, 2022, using Medicare fee-for-service claims data. Participants were Medicare beneficiaries attributed to primary care practices in Michigan. The study found that office-based low-value care services were lower among practices with high telehealth use, and there was no association between practice-level telehealth use and rates of most other low-value care services not delivered in the office. The study authors suggest there is potential for telehealth to help reduce office-based low-value care and the results could reassure policymakers concerned about telehealth encouraging unnecessary or wasteful care due to added convenience.