Healthcare part of the plan, tech chief says

For Aneesh Chopra, the word commonwealth has double meaning.

It is the governmental structure of several states, including Virginia, where Chopra, chosen by President Barack Obama last April as the first chief technology officer of the U.S., previously served as that state's secretary of technology.

Commonwealth also describes a view of technology in which society, including both government and business, can share to provide mutual benefits.

Chopra spoke for an hour Wednesday at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society meeting in Atlanta, and then hosted an hourlong forum on technology immediately afterward.

While healthcare IT is not Chopra's exclusive domain, using technology to improve patient care and reduce healthcare costs is very much on his agenda. For example, Chopra said a national plan on the use of broadband information technology to create a “national IT ecosystem” will be released in a matter of weeks, and “that plan will have a very explicit plan around healthcare,” Chopra said.

Chopra said the government can assist in creating an environment for innovation, but the private sector is where much of the innovation in technology will occur.

“We are all about entrepreneurship,” Chopra said “Entrepreneurs have to go about doing their business. We will be hawks on pro-entrepreneurship.”

One example of such collaboration in the innovative use of technology Chopra cited is the Text4baby program. Under the program, expectant or new mothers sign up to received three text messages a week with health information relative to the stage of their pregnancies or age of the babies. The program tries to bring information to mothers who might not have access to the Internet but do have cell phones. It is an attempt to address racial and economic disparities in our healthcare system and improve the U.S.' sagging infant mortality rate, which ranks 45th in the world below Cuba, Taiwan, Greece and the United Kingdom among others, according to the Central Intelligence Agency's World Fact Book.

Chopra assumed his federal post in August following his Senate confirmation. Chopra also serves as associate director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. As Virginia's tech guru, Chopra developed a reputation for pushing the technology envelope to improve government services.

Chopra has a bachelor of arts degree from Johns Hopkins University and a master's degree in public policy administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Chopra said the key in healthcare innovation will be to both play safe with technology, but also to take risks where risks can be managed safely.

“The innovation strategy that we're pushing is to find that balance,” Chopra said. “Don't put critical infrastructure at risk.

“Get your five nines and God bless you,” he said, referring to a network reliability percentage of 99.999% uptime, or, conversely, roughly 5 minutes of downtime per year. “But if we tap into your creative spirit, new products will be born.”