Defense Health Agency

Dave Bowen, the director of health care IT and chief information officer for DHA, said the business case for the three-month-old organization shows potential savings by eliminating duplicative systems, networks and applications.

DoD opens its electronic medical records to VA claims processors for the first time. The goal is to shave days or weeks from the time it takes VA to decide disability claims for recently separated service members. But the launch of the system has had a few bugs.

Defense officials hope a new era in military medicine has arrived. The centerpiece is the seven-month-old Defense Health Agency. It replaced TRICARE Management Activity as part of efforts to streamline the delivery of medical services. Maj. Gen. Richard Thomas is the Chief Medical Officer and director of DHA’s Operations Command. As part of Federal News Radio’s Agency of the Month, he tells Coordinating Producer Lauren Larson how the agency is streamlining delivery and cutting healthcare costs.

From health records to rubber gloves, the Defense Health Agency is streamlining health care at the Pentagon. In this week’s Agency of the Month radio show, host Lauren Larson speaks with Navy Capt. James Poindexter, acting division chief of Medical Logistics Shared Services, and Dave Bowen, director of health care IT and chief information officer at the Defense Health Agency.

The Defense Health agency is streamlining healthcare. It’s standardizing the clinical process across its 57 hospitals and 300 clinics and cutting back on excess medical supplies, with the help of the Defense Logistics Agency. Dave Bowen is director of health care IT and chief information officer of the Defense Health Agency. Navy Capt. James Poindexter is acting division chief of Medical Logistics Shared Services. In this week’s edition of Agency of the Month, they tell Federal News Radio’s Lauren Larson how the new processes save the agency money. Read Federal News Radio’s related article.

The Defense Health Agency is conducting market research in advance of a planned RFP for a 10-year, $20 billion IT services and support contract. It’s possible that vendors will be added to the contract without a formal source selection process.

A Pentagon review of the military’s health facilities concluded the quality of DoD’s medical system is generally in line with what’s offered by private sector providers. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said “average” is not good enough.

Dave Bowen, the Defense Health Agency CIO, said getting the military services to sign off on a concept of operations for health IT shared services is a huge step toward meeting an Oct. 1 deadline to reach full operational capability.

Next week in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, hundreds of the military’s smartest minds will come together for the biggest annual gathering in the world of military medicine. In past years, the Military Health System Research Symposium has led to the expansion of revolutionary new practices in combat care – many of which have made their way into the civilian sector. Col.Todd Rasmussen directs the Army’s Combat Casualty Care Research Program, and Rear Adm. Bruce Doll directs research and development at the Defense Health Agency. They talked with Federal News Radio’s Jared Serbu about what they expect from next week’s conference.

As the new Defense Health Agency pushes forward toward its Oct. 1 target date to declare full operational capability, it’s bringing three existing DoD medical institutions into the fold.