White House Briefing on “Advancing Health Equity through Health IT Innovation and Collaboration”
On the morning of April 22, 2015 the White House hosted the “Advancing Health Equity through Health IT Innovation and Collaboration” briefing on behalf of the NHIT Collaborative. The briefing featured opening remarks from Julie Chavez Rodriguez, White House Deputy Director of Public Engagement, and Dr. J. Nadine Gracia, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Minority Health and Director of the Office of Minority Health at HHS, who focused on the opportunities for health equity that have persisted in the 30 years since Margaret Heckler’s landmark report on health disparities in underserved and minority communities. A panel discussion with Obama Administration officials including Dr. DJ Patil, Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Data Policy and Chief Data Scientist in the Office of Science and Technology Policy, Dr. Thomas Mason, Chief Medical Officer (CMO) at ONC/HHS, Bryan Sivak, Former Chief Technology Officer at HHS, and Dr. Yvonne T. Maddox, Former Acting Director at National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD), spurred participants from the public and private sectors to use open data and technology to achieve health equity and to eliminate health disparities.​