WellPoint Exec Joins Advisory Board

By Staff Writer

April 03, 2009 at 08:00 PM

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Dr. Charles Kennedy is now a member of the federal Health Information Technology Policy Committee.

A provision of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act created the committee, in effort to speed up efforts to persuade doctors and hospitals to use compatible electronic health record systems.

Kennedy, who will serve a 3-year term on the committee, is a vice president for health information technology at WellPoint Inc., Indianapolis, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Kennedy lives in Camarillo, Calif.

The ARRA health information policy committee provision gives the head of the GAO the authority to appoint 13 of the committee members, with members of Congress, the president and the head of the Department of Health and Human Services appointing other members.

In addition to appointing Kennedy to the committee to represent insurers, Gene Dodaro, the acting head of the GAO, has appointed David Lansky to represent "purchasers or employers."

Lansky, a San Francisco resident who will serve on the committee for 1 years, is president of the Pacific Business Group on Health, San Francisco.

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