The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT has announced that Farzad Mostashari will take over duties as national coordinator once David Blumenthal steps down from the position to return to his academic career.
Mostashari served as deputy national coordinator under Blumenthal for the past two years, and many stakeholders in the electronic health records community say that they feel he is well prepared to take the reins.
"Dr. Mostashari's leadership on a number of issues, including provider adoption and associated certification requirements, interoperability and health information exchange, and efforts to engage all communities in driving the innovation that is necessary for transforming healthcare," Steven Lieber, president and CEO of the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society, said in a statement.
He added that he expects Mostashari to proceed in a similar direction as his predecessor in the pushing the nation to adopt electronic health records, and that this would do a tremendous services to the nation and the healthcare system.
"We are very comfortable with the directions he advocates," Lieber said.
Mostashari gained a significant amount of experience prior to landing at the Office of the National Coordinator. He previously acted as commissioner for the Primary Care Information Project of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. In this role, he led more than 1,500 providers in the adoption of electronic health records systems that were aimed at preventing diseases in underserved communities.
He has also led several projects, including one funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, intended to encourage measuring the quality of care in clinical settings. He earned degrees from both Harvard and Yale Universities and has been very active in the use of electronic health records for epidemiological purposes.
When David Blumenthal announced that he would be stepping down, some health IT stakeholders that it would leave a tremendous gap in the government's efforts to encourage electronic health records adoption. However, many of these people believe Mostashari will be similarly effective.
"Farzad's combination of policy knowledge, familiarity with the needs of small providers, and passion for improving health with IT tools will serve the country well," John Halamka, CIO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, told Government Health IT.