CMS Announces Creation of ‘Digital Health Ecosystem’
Yesterday, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced plans to establish a “digital health ecosystem” in partnership with healthcare and information technology firms, including Amazon, Anthropic, Apple, Google and OpenAI. CMS said in its statement that the goal of the initiative is to improve patient outcomes, reduce provider burden, and drive enhanced value. The plan promotes use of an interoperability framework to improve information sharing between patients and providers, and enhancing access to personalized tools patients can access to help make informed health decisions.   

At a White House event, CMS announced voluntary criteria for data exchange that will be accessible for all network types—health information networks and exchanges, electronic health records, and tech platforms. CMS said more than 60 companies have pledged to meet certain objectives by the first quarter of 2026, with 21 networks pledging to meet the CMS Interoperability Framework criteria to become CMS Aligned Networks. 

Joint Commission Announces Children’s Health Strategy
This week the Joint Commission announced a new children’s healthcare initiative it says is designed to address gaps in how children’s hospitals are accredited and certified for the care they provide children. This initiative acknowledges children’s unique healthcare needs, as currently, standards do not distinguish between the respective healthcare needs of adults and children.

In response to requests from the children’s health community, Joint Commission’s initial focus will be evolving its accreditation and certification programs for dedicated children’s hospitals, aiming to remove and/or revise inapplicable standards to better suit the circumstances of these organizations. To help determine what standards will be edited, Joint Commission has formed a Children’s Healthcare Advisory Committee that will advise on the development of this and other frameworks.

Cybersecurity Advisory on Scattered Spider Tactics
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency joined international partners to issue a cybersecurity advisory providing updated information and new tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) associated with recent activity by the Scattered Spider cybercriminal group. Scattered Spider targets large companies and their IT help desks, typically engaging in data theft for extortion. The group also uses ransomware variants once they gain access to a system in order to steal information. Notably, Scattered Spider frequently employs tactics like phishing, push bombing, and subscriber identity module swap attacks to get credentials, bypass multifactor authentication, and gain access to networks. The group has also impersonated company help desks to trick users into divulging credentials. The advisory contains mitigation recommendations that organizations are encouraged to review in order to reduce the likelihood and impact of Scatter Spider activity. 

DUE TODAY: Medicaid IMPACT Revalidations Due to Ensure Reimbursement 
The Illinois Dept. of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) is currently conducting IMPACT Medicaid provider revalidations. Providers in the July cohort must complete IMPACT revalidations by today, July 31. Completing this information is necessary to continue receiving Medicaid reimbursement. If you are in this revalidation cycle and do not submit your revalidation information by July 31 you will be disenrolled from the IMPACT system and cannot receive retroactive enrollment. IHA urges all providers to check their revalidation cycle due date—including physicians and physician groups affiliated with your hospitals—and to check for any incomplete revalidations. NOTE: If a physician providing services at your hospital does not revalidate, your hospital will not receive payment for those services provided by that physician. 

To check your revalidation due date, search the basic information page of your IMPACT enrollment. HFS has provided IHA with step-by-step instructions to check the status and due date of servicing providers that you can access here. The IMPACT Provider Revalidation website includes step-by-step instructions, a frequently asked questions document and townhall webinar recording.