In May, Andy Slavitt, CMS www.cms.gov Acting Administrator announced a new effort to connect new innovative companies and their investors to the state Medicaid program IT space. He explained, “While there are 56 different state, district, and territorial Medicaid programs, there is a lot in common among their IT needs.
CMS is ready to financially and operationally partner with states and the private sector to improve state programs. The Federal government alone invests more than $5 billion per year in Medicaid IT and matches up to 90 percent on new projects. As Slavitt reports, “At this time, there still may be some apprehension by IT companies both large and small, new, or established to engage in bidding for state government contracts.”
A one-stop-shop has been created for the tech community to connect with states looking for innovative solutions. By using the one-stop-shop site, vendors are able to find links to state Medicaid procurement web sites and to any open state Medicaid IT Requests for Proposals. Go to www.medicaid.gov then search for one-stop-shop to find individual state information.
In addition, CMS is developing a “Playbook” to help companies translate state requests into projects they can handle. CMS is inviting vendors to seek precertification from CMS for their Medicaid IT solutions and put their names and products on a “Pre-Certified Medicaid Modules” list on the www.medicaid.gov website.