Electronic Health Record Association Announces Leadership Team and Priorities for FY25

CHICAGO / AGILITYPR.NEWS / January 07, 2025 / The HIMSS Electronic Health Record (EHR) Association announced today that Leigh Burchell, Vice President of Policy and Government Affairs at Altera Digital Health, was elected Chair of its Executive Committee during elections for leadership terms that began Jan. 1, 2025. Burchell previously served as Chair of the trade association from 2015 to 2016. 

After serving as Chair this past year, Stephanie Jamison, Senior Director of Regulatory and Government Affairs with Greenway Health, has transitioned to Vice Chair of the trade association. The EHR Association’s 29 member companies serve most of the nation’s hospitals and ambulatory care organizations using EHRs and other health information and technology to deliver high-quality, efficient care to their patients. 

Newly elected to the Executive Committee, which establishes the Association’s guiding principles and develops and implements strategic plans, was Michelle Knighton, Regulatory Programs Director at NextGen Healthcare. Re-elected members are:

• Danielle Friend, Director of Integrations, Epic
• Kayla Thomas, Senior Regulatory Strategist, Oracle Health

Executive Committee members whose two-year terms on the Executive Committee continue in 2025 are:

• David Bucciferro, Senior Advisor, Foothold Technology-Radicle Health
• Ida Mantashi, Assistant Vice President of Software Regulatory Compliance, Modernizing Medicine
• Shari Medina, MD, Medical Director, Harris Healthcare

Past Chairs Hans Buitendijk, Director of Interoperability Strategy with Oracle Health, Cherie Holmes-Henry, Vice President of Government and Industry Affairs at Nextgen Healthcare, and Sasha TerMaat, Director at Epic, all continue as ex-officio Executive Committee members.

EHR and other health IT developers and the providers using their solutions are anticipating legislation from Congress addressing artificial intelligence (AI), cybersecurity, and data privacy—as well as the impact of additional iterations of the Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy’s (ASTP) Health Data, Technology, and Interoperability (HTI) rulemaking. Additionally, the EHR Association is aware that there will be further laws and regulations coming from the states specific to health IT and its usage by provider organizations, and this activity will continue to demand increasing levels of attention and development response from the health IT industry. 

“The EHR Association plays an important role in political transition years because that cycle means the arrival of many new people who will be making or influencing health IT policy,” says Burchell. “The subject matter expertise we collectively offer on timely topics such as AI, TEFCA, and cybersecurity, coupled with our commitment to advancing the quality and efficiency of healthcare through the use of innovative technologies, will again position us as a valuable resource to new Congressional offices, leaders in the Administration, and state policy makers.”

Adds Jamison: “Public policy touches virtually all areas of the health IT industry at this point, and the EHR Association’s work to ensure the industry’s voice is heard by CMS, ASTP and other key regulatory agencies is more important than ever. Ongoing collaboration amongst subject matter experts from our member companies ensures we contribute critical perspectives to policy discussions and raise the perspectives of the healthcare providers we serve.”