Three new members join Health IT Policy Committee
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) announced three appointments to the Health IT Policy Committee; each will serve three-year terms. The new members are:
- Dave Kotz, PhD, will serve as an expert in privacy and security matters. Kotz is a professor of computer science at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., and an associate dean of the Faculty for the Sciences. He previously served as the executive director of the Dartmouth Institute for Security Technology Studies. Kotz’s research has focused on the challenges of applying information technology to healthcare with an emphasis on privacy and security.
- Devin Mann, MD, MS, will fill the position of a researcher. He currently is an assistant professor of medicine at Boston University’s School of Medicine as well as an attending physician at Boston Medical Center. His research has focused on the use of health IT in improving clinical care, such as developing decision support systems with EHRs to support advanced medical home care.
- Troy Seagondollar, RN, will fill the position of a member of a labor organization representing healthcare workers. Seagondollar serves as regional nursing technology liaison for the Kaiser Permanente southern California regional offices and the United Nurses Association of California. He serves as the liaison between multiple groups in discussing business needs and IT with regard to the clinical impact on the workplace. He also is on the associate faculty of nursing at the University of Phoenix.
“In developing policy for health IT, it’s important to take into account expertise related to privacy and security and to healthcare research as well as the views of healthcare workers who are the users of HIT. A number of individuals with backgrounds in these areas responded to GAO’s request for nominations, and I am pleased to announce the addition of today’s new appointments to the HIT Policy Committee,” Gene L. Dodaro, comptroller general of the U.S. and head of the GAO, said in a statement.