WASHINGTON – The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT has named two healthcare policy experts to manage its "Beacon" communities project, a $200 million grant program designed to showcase how health IT can improve population health.
ONC named Aaron McKethan, a research director at the Brookings Institution's Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform as the Beacon program director.
Craig Brammer, a project director at Cincinnati's Aligning Forces for Quality, an initiative of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, was named deputy director. He will report to McKethan.
McKethan came on board March 15 and Brammer will start in April, an ONC spokesman said.
Under the Beacon Communities program, ONC will award grants to about 15 nonprofit organizations or government bodies where communities are well on their way to meaningful use of electronic health records.
A fair portion of their local providers must already be using EHRs and exchanging health information. The goal is for these communities to demonstrate to other locales how to get to meaningful use and improve healthcare quality and overall population health outcomes.
ONC has not said when it anticipates awarding the Beacon Community grants.
At Brookings, McKethan focused on provider payment and delivery system reforms. As a health policy consultant previously, he concentrated on state health reform, Medicaid financing issues, and delivery system reform.
He is also an assistant professorial lecturer of health policy in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University Medical Center, School of Public Health and Health Services.
In Cincinnati, Brammer coordinated the efforts of a number of local organizations to improve the quality of care and help consumers better understand their role in achieving better quality, said Greg Ebel, executive director of the Health Improvement Collaborative of Greater Cincinnati, which led the Aligning Forces for Quality effort in that region.
Cincinnati was one of 15 regions the foundation selected to pull together consumer groups, health plans, physicians, employers and health centers in a coordinated effort to improve healthcare quality.
"Craig's talents have put Cincinnati on the leading edge of health reform and improvements," Ebel said.
