Doing Business Smarter

Veterans Administration Healthcare Delivery

Scenario: During 2004, the Veterans Administration (VA) continued to develop a significant modernization program aimed at improving the manner in which our veterans receive healthcare. Known as HealtheVet-VistA, this program represents a major capital investment for the VA.

Thanks to this program, all veterans—including our troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan—will be able to make appointments at any VA hospital quickly and easily. Virtual health records will be reliably secured and accessible nationwide, and online prescription processing will be available. Not only will veterans be able to order prescriptions online, their physicians will also be automatically notified of any potential drug interactions. What is more, the Tele-health initiative will enable veterans convalescing at home to be diagnosed and monitored by VA physicians remotely. Through this initiative, convalescing patients will be able to receive healthcare without having to visit a VA medical center. As part of the ongoing effort to provide quality healthcare, these upgrades are dramatically changing the way the VA delivers healthcare to our service veterans.

HPTi personnel are supporting this initiative through our work with the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) Office of Information. We are working in partnership with the VHA's program directors as they manage and deliver the rollout of these important healthcare capabilities. HPTi business analysts support the effort by developing business cases and budget justifications for major releases of the modernization effort. In addition, HPTi program management specialists are working to implement and monitor effective program/project management methods and tools. As issues with the modernization deployment arise, they analyze the situation from a program-management perspective and recommend corrective action.

Medical Safety

Scenario: The FDA is prepared to approve a new drug that would benefit millions of Americans, but it is critical that the labeling is accurate and that complete information is readily available. A structured, reliable labeling system would address many of the risks associated with the drug's release. The FDA turns to HPTi for a solution.

The Structured Product Labeling (SPL) system is of national importance, as it affects the accuracy and approval process for labeling drugs. HPTi provides IT and business program-management support on the SPL program to automate the current manual processes. By implementing IT systems, we are helping the FDA to significantly improve the process for reviewing and distributing drug-labeling data.

This is one way in which the FDA relies on HPTi to help improve national healthcare. Through the HPTi-led Project Management Office, HPTi team members mentor FDA project managers on better ways to conduct business, implement new technology tools and techniques, and improve processes. All of these supporting duties help to make the work and energies of the FDA more effective—and American lives healthier.

Department of Homeland Security Enterprise Architecture

Scenario: Created in early 2003, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) faced the daunting challenge of integrating 22 agencies around a critically important mission—to protect the U.S. homeland. Early on, DHS recognized that the best way to tackle this challenge was to develop an enterprise architecture that correlated each of the departments' systems with its own unified mission. The second version of this architecture was completed during 2004, enabling the DHS to prioritize those systems that needed upgrading or replacing and to create a transition plan for the modernization effort.

Enterprise architects from HPTi are playing key roles in this effort. Working in a collaborative team environment with government and other contractor personnel, HPTi team members led the assessment of the current systems and helped define the transition strategy. In addition, HPTi's senior enterprise architect led the creation of the overall EA development methodology.

The architecture developed through these efforts has become the cornerstone of the department's vision for the future. HPTi is proud of these contributions toward protecting America's safety and prosperity.

Who's Who?

Scenario: Electronic communication allows government employees to pass information among themselves and federal contractors every day without face-to-face interaction. Without any way to positively identify where information is coming from—or where it is going—government employees cannot be absolutely certain that their information is safe. To rectify this, the government needs an easy, reliable way to authenticate the identities of the people who are transmitting information electronically across its systems.

HPTi is helping to develop a robust tool at the Treasury's Financial Management Service (FMS) to process and manage the security credentials of those who use FMS electronic systems. HPTi has designed and developed the Integrated Trusted Registration Application (ITRA)—a highly secure tool for processing and managing security credentials over the Internet. In the past, all security credentials were issued and managed by a limited number of Trusted Registration Administrators (TRA) located at an FMS facility. Until recently, these administrators vetted the identities of personnel using largely manual processes—at best, a time-consuming and tedious process. In addition, all requests had to be physically delivered to and from the FMS facility. Now, with ITRA, FMS has TRAs located at many federal agencies—eliminating the bottleneck caused by sending applications to and from the FMS facility. For example, if FEMA wants to issue credentials to access the Secure Payment System, users can visit a TRA located at FEMA. No longer do they have to visit an FMS office to receive a credential to access FMS systems. Through ITRA, the FMS can now process security credentials safely and efficiently.