Who’s Going to Civitas?

Civitas Networks for Health 2024 Annual Conference Bridging Data and Doing

When: October 15-17, 2024
Where: Detroit Marriott at the Renaissance Center, Detroit, MI
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Hashtag: #Civitas2024
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This year’s conference aims to continue the valuable conversations and initiatives spurred by last year’s gathering in Maryland, focusing on the latest developments in health data sharing, community health, social determinants of health, health equity, and more.

We ask who was going and what they are looking forward to. Here is who is going and what they had to say.

See you in Detroit!

Scott Stuewe, President and CEO, DirectTrust
LinkedIn: Scott Stuewe

The Civitas conference offers a great opportunity to learn about the innovative ways HIEs are utilizing Direct Secure Messaging. I’m keen to explore how HIEs are addressing third-party risk management, especially given their deep connections to regional healthcare players and their significance to the states they serve. Additionally, I’m interested in hearing how they plan to stay relevant in the TEFCA era, whether inside or outside of it. This community is filled with long-time friends and colleagues, and I’m really looking forward to seeing everyone in person.

Lou LaRocca, CEO, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Lou LaRocca

Civitas is truly one of my favorite conferences of the year and something I genuinely look forward to. It’s a sea of familiar faces and healthcare champions, each of whom is working to make healthcare better for everyone. It’s a room I want to be in and company I’m proud to keep.

Bevey Miner, Executive Vice President, Healthcare Strategy and Policy, Consensus Cloud Solutions
LinkedIn: Bevey Miner

With interoperability and data sharing at the forefront of solutions that promise to lead to better patient care, events like Civitas are valuable to convene technology, developers, providers, and other stakeholders to innovate around ways we can all work together to further this goal. We are on the cusp of regulations and adoption of new standards moving at a faster pace than we have seen in the last two decades of interoperability conversation. I am looking forward to meeting with colleagues and exploring how we can remove obstacles and advance interoperability in ways we haven’t thought of.

Rajib Ghosh, Founder and CEO, Health Roads
LinkedIn: Rajib Ghosh

I am looking forward to deepening existing professional relationships and creating new ones to discuss cross-sectorial data interoperability challenges and solutions. I am especially excited to convene leaders from Innovaccer, Manifest Medex and Serving Communities HIO (SCHIO) together for an in-person panel discussion on Health Data Interoperability and Use of AI to Advance Care.

Suni Guempel, Salesforce Program Manager, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Suni Guempel, BSN, RN

I’m thrilled to be attending Civitas for the first time this year! Civitas is a key event for sharing ideas and best practices, and I’m looking forward to learning from others while sharing the insight we’ve gained from our recent HIE implementations.

Adam Sand, COO and General Counsel, Selfiie
LinkedIn: Adam Sand

Despite significant efforts, patients’ access to complete medical records are still fragmented and too complex, falling way short of the vision outlined in the Cures Act. This gap in interoperability hinders patient engagement, care coordination and better patient outcomes nationwide and there’s no better place to talk about solutions than Civitas 2024. We’re eager to share our latest innovations at Civitas 2024, not just to highlight what we’ve achieved but to collaborate on the remaining obstacles and roadmap toward the future.

Becky Durant, Director of Professional Services, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Becky Durant

Civitas is always such a warm and inviting event, where we get to spend quality time with our clients and partners, discussing their needs, as well as the ever evolving landscape of health information exchanges and data sharing. I am really looking forward to connecting, trading stories, and learning from the wealth of knowledge being shared.

Kevin Day, CTO, Rhapsody
LinkedIn: Kevin Day

Besides the energy and excitement being in Detroit brings, I’m looking forward to seeing all the innovation happening in healthcare. We don’t always think of health information exchanges, public health, or state departments of health being the catalysts of change, and yet that’s what’s happening. I can’t wait to network with all these leaders and understand how seamless, high quality data exchange is fundamental to the work they’re doing. Networking overall with our customers and their peers will be a highlight of attending.

Jeremiah Hebert, Program Manager, Public Sector, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Jeremiah Hebert, PMP

I’m really excited to be attending Civitas 2024 and to connect with such a talented group of experts. This industry is incredible because the innovation we create has a real impact on helping others, and I’m excited to be part of those conversations with some of the best in the field.

Gregg Church, President, 4medica
LinkedIn: Gregg Church

I’m excited to attend the Civitas Annual Conference in October and learn more about the critical role of health data exchange in improving whole-person care. I hope the conference will emphasize the importance of data privacy and safety in this context. Stakeholders must be held accountable for how data is used, especially in community care and health data utility models. Ultimately, individuals have the right to control how their data is used, and trusted exchange data roles and responsibilities must be clearly defined and adhered to. It’s essential to remember that networks don’t own clinical and community care data but are granted permission to use it responsibly, securely, and reliably, always prioritizing privacy and safety.

Rachel Warnock, Director of Marketing, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Rachel Warnock

Visit J2 in their Booth

I’m thrilled to be attending my first Civitas! Public health is one of my favorite topics and there’s no better place to move the needle or champion a new public health initiative than at Civitas. I’m counting down the days!

Kelley Gallagher, Program Manager, Governance & Corporate Compliance, CRISP and CRISP Shared Services
LinkedIn: Kelley Gallagher

What I am looking most forward to at this year’s Civitas conference is having the opportunity to connect – and reconnect – with the talented people who attend! Ours is a dynamic and diverse community, and Civitas members – whether HIEs, HDUs, RHICs, or technologists – bring different perspectives to the table. All are committed to improving patient health and quality of life through creative solutions and stakeholder relationships however, and I am eager to learn about other’s work, swap best practices and use cases, and find new opportunities to collaborate.

Phil Beckett, CEO, C3HIE
LinkedIn: Philip Beckett

I’m looking forward to catching up with all my friends and colleagues at the Civitas Annual Conference. Learning and sharing experiences, workflows, opportunities, new ideas and stories with each other is extremely valuable. There is an outstanding line up of speakers and presenters and will be trying to attend as many as I can as well as visiting and engaging with our SB&T partners. Thanks to our sponsors, the host committee and the Civitas team for making this all possible and easily the highlight of my year.

Susan Clark, Senior Director of Community & Advocacy, DirectTrust
LinkedIn: Susan Clark

At the upcoming Civitas conference, I’m excited to learn how HIEs are expanding their use cases. In particular, I’m eager to explore how they are incorporating and leveraging new data sets or functionality in critical areas like consent management, social care, emergency management, patient access, foster care, long-term care, behavioral health, payers, and government. Additionally, I’m looking forward to gaining insights on how HIEs are preparing to, or decidedly not to, onboard with TEFCA. The conference will also be a chance to learn how Civitas and its members are advancing policy and advocacy, and understanding their key policy focuses to explore future collaborative efforts. And, of course, networking will be a highlight as I reconnect with current DirectTrust members and forge new relationships with attendees and sponsors, aiming for opportunities that could bring mutual benefits.

Kirk Grothe, Head of Government, InterSystems
LinkedIn: Kirk Grothe

We look forward each year to seeing our current customers, former customers, friends, and the interoperability community. For us, it’s a chance to connect, chat, and learn. We’re excited to be presenting at one of the sessions and we’re happy that we can sponsor the post award ceremony reception. There is no better venue to exchange ideas about health data sharing relating to community health, social needs, and health equity than the annual CIVITAS Networks for Health conference.

Marilee Benson, President/ Cofounder, Zen Healthcare IT
LinkedIn: Marilee Benson

Visit Zen in their Booth

The Annual Civitas for Health Conference is my favorite event of the year. Zen has been working with HIEs since our start nine years ago, and this is a fantastic opportunity to reconnect with our HIE friends and clients. These in-person discussions lead to a better understanding of the priorities and challenges our clients are facing. I particularly enjoy introducing our clients to each other. This has grown to be a big conference and they do not always know each other already. These smaller group conversations allow for a lot of creative problem solving and exchanging of ideas. Can’t wait to see everyone in Detroit!

Jen Carter, Executive Director of Alliances, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Jen (Adams) Carter

Conferences are about making connections, and there is no greater opportunity to connect the dots in the HIE interoperability space than the annual Civitas conference!

Nicholas Orser, Senior Director, Product Marketing, Verato
LinkedIn: Nick Orser

Visit Verato in their Booth

HIEs are evolving to deliver even more value to their communities — like powering public health and Medicaid projects, enabling patients’ individual access, collaborating with payers, offering new value-based care and population health analytics, combining claims and clinical data for actionable insights, and serving a myriad of stakeholders. But with this evolution it becomes even more critical to orchestrate the right strategic technology partnerships to realize these growth opportunities. I am excited about attending CIVITAS to uncover the next generation use cases that are top of mind for HIEs as well as areas of innovation to help power their strategic vision through technology.

Patrick Hobson, Director of Marketing, Secure Exchange Solutions
LinkedIn: Edward Patrick Hobson

The Civitas Annual Conference provides many great opportunities to connect with clients, partners and colleagues. Secure Exchange Solutions is a long-time supporter of the HIE community and a trusted partner to many Civitas members, so it is helpful to understand the technology and regulatory challenges impacting the industry. The conference agenda provides learning sessions and health information exchange best practices for topics such as TEFCA, data governance, artificial intelligence, partnerships to improve care coordination, and social determinants of health. And the social networking events are the best! See you at the conference.

Angie Bass, MHA, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, Velatura
LinkedIn: Angie Bass, MHA

As a proud member of the Civitas Networks for Health Board of Directors, I am particularly excited for this year’s annual conference in Detroit. This event brings together some of the best and brightest minds in the field of health information exchange, offering an invaluable opportunity to collaborate on advancing interoperability and data-sharing efforts nationwide. I’m eager to explore how artificial intelligence (AI) can enhance the utility of health data, making it more actionable for providers and improving public health outcomes. I’m also especially looking forward to discussing strategies for engaging federal agencies to advance our shared goal of moving HDU forward. See you soon, Motor City!

Tim Wood, Patient Experience Advocate, J2 Interactive
LinkedIn: Tim Wood

What always excites me about the Civitas conference is that you are bringing together individuals from across the country that are truly passionate about making an impact on the health of the nation. I believe that this is an unsung collective that deserves recognition for the critical services they provide.

Maritza Lara, Executive Director, Health Improvement Partnership of Santa Cruz County
LinkedIn: Maritza Lara

The emphasis of the CIVITAS conference on cross-sector partnerships, social determinants of health, and data sharing technologies perfectly complements the initiatives we are driving at the Health Improvement Partnership of Santa Cruz County. I’m particularly looking forward to the sessions covering closed-loop referrals, health data sharing, and multi-stakeholder partnerships. These topics will provide key insights into how standardized information exchanges between social services and healthcare can strengthen the delivery of comprehensive, person-centered care.