AFCEA Bethesda’s Acquisition & Public Health Day March 30, 2021 https://bethesda.afceachapters.org, presented a panel discussion focused on how the role of information technology has changed within the public health sector.
Steve Posnack, MHS Deputy National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, (ONC), https://www.healthit.gov as Moderator for the panel, emphasized how IT must meet today’s health IT demands and must deal with the challenges related to interoperability.
Paul Kundtz, Director, Division of Information Technology Operations, Indian Health Service (IHS) https://www.ihs.gov, emphasized how important it is for the IHS to have the right infrastructure in place at the agency. It is necessary to deal with new acquisitions in order to expand the infrastructure so personnel in the agency can work remotely if needed.
He reports that the IHS conducted 40,000 visits via telehealth during the pandemic’s peak, but today that figure is 30,000 visits. However, what is really needed in rural areas is broadband to meet the needs of the digital divide. He is looking for a robust cloud solution to help and later on is expected drive down costs. On the horizon, he sees low orbit satellites as a solution ready to take off to bridge the digital divide.
We must have a solid data infrastructure and plan to deal with the pandemic according to Vid Desai, Chief Technology Officer, FDA https://www.fda.gov. This can be achieved by updating the infrastructure, support the review approvals during the difficult times, support personnel working remotely, keep the data collection clean since healthcare can’t cope with uncertainty, plus deal effectively with cybersecurity.
Dr. Sara Brenner, Chief Medical Officer for In Vitro Diagnostics and Associate Director for Medical Affairs in the Center for Devices and Radiological Health at FDA, pointed out how HHS has worked very hard during the difficult times on data quality and flow. She reports, FDA has been very involved since the start of COVID, in testing issues and virtual aspects and she looks for these virtual aspects to continue to operate and be successful.
She also sees some problems with laboratories and their use of technology and sees the need for laboratories to upgrade their data but at the same time, state and federal government cooperation is needed. Today, since technology is always revolving, this can also bring challenges.
She points out that this means that new opportunities on the horizon will be available to modernize diagnostics and home care point-of-care devices. As a result, the new information obtained needs to be brought to the public health level. This hopefully should result in a new information highway and move public health into the modern age.
CDR Heather Dimeris, Deputy Associate Director, Federal Office of Rural Health Policy at HRSA https://www.hrsa.gov sees an increase for big of technology, which will require the need to improve platforms. She said, “It is important to look at data to examine what worked well and the results to see how much of the medical and health community and population has benefited from the use of telehealth.”
She is pleased that the Federal government and stakeholders were able to collaborate along with state and local governments to try to find solutions to some of the unprecedented events that took place as a result of the pandemic and but also still continues today.