U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Sylvia Mathews Burwell and Dell CEO Michael Dell will speak at the opening session of the 2016 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition.
HHS set an ambitious goal at the beginning of 2015, with Burwell pledging to tie 30 percent of fee-for-service Medicare payments to quality or value through alternative payment models such as accountable care organizations or bundled payments by the end of 2016.
"We believe these goals can drive transformative change, help us manage and track progress, and create accountability for measurable improvement," she said on Jan. 26, 2015.
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Almost exactly one year later at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Burwell said HHS is on target to accomplish just that.
This past year also saw the Supreme Court in King v. Burwell decide 6-3 that residents in the 34 states with federal insurance exchanges can keep their tax subsidies for health coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
Since taking office in 2014, Burwell has seen it as her mission at HHS to ensure that "every American has access to the building blocks of healthy and productive lives." She saw the Supreme Court decision as in line with that goal.
Michael Dell has also had a significant year: In October, his company announced its intent to acquire storage giant EMC for $67 billion – the largest technology deal of all time.
The merger would result in the world's biggest privately-held IT company, whose data storage, clinical technologies, analytics engines, security tools and mobile apps are deployed in hospitals and health systems across the world.
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A rocky recent stock market has led some analysts to wonder whether the deal could be imperiled, but Dell himself said on Jan. 22 that the two companies are "moving along at a steady pace."
Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN
