Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC)CPIC is a structured approach to managing IT investments. CPIC ensures that IT investments align with the IHS mission, strategic goals, and objectives, and support business needs, while minimizing risks and maximizing returns throughout the investment’s life cycle. CPIC relies on systematic selection, control, and continual evaluation processes to ensure that the investment’s objectives are met effectively. Investments in IT can dramatically enhance organizational performance. When carefully managed, IT becomes a critical enabler to improve business processes, makes information widely available, and reduces the cost of providing essential Government services. As IT rapidly evolves, the challenge of realizing its potential benefits also becomes much greater. Congress and OMB have clearly stated that each executive agency must actively manage its IT program to provide assurances that technology expenditures are necessary and shall result in demonstrated improvements in mission effectiveness and customer service. The Clinger-Cohen Act (CCA) of 1996, Public Law 104 – 106, legislatively mandates that IT investments be prudently managed. One key CCA goal is for divisions to develop policies and processes that implement systems at acceptable costs, within reasonable and expected time frames, and that contribute to tangible, observable improvements in mission performance. Therefore, CPIC processes shall be institutionalized throughout IHS, shall ensure compliance with the IHS Enterprise Architecture, and shall be used for all IT-related decisions. Carl Gervais 5300 Homestead Road NE |
The Resource and Patient Management System (RPMS) is a componentized electronic healthcare information system that provides Practice Management functions for IHS-direct, tribal and urban healthcare delivery facilities throughout the United States. RPMS provides accurate, timely, and comprehensive clinical and administrative information to local health care providers and program managers and provides administrative information at the regional and national levels. The ultimate purpose of the RPMS is to improve the availability of medical information on American Indian and Alaska Native patients, thereby improving the diagnoses, decision making and health care recommendations of IHS physicians and other IHS health care providers. 
The technology infrastructure for IHS spans throughout the IHS, tribal and urban (I/T/U) facilities and is managed under the IHS Infrastructure, Office Automation, and Telecommunications (IOAT) investment. Projects are generally initiated centrally and cascade through the enterprise. The IHS telecommunications infrastructure connects (I/T/U) facilities together and to the national data repository. This infrastructure is used for data transmission, voice traffic, and Internet/Intranet access. The capacity to support data transmission as well as new telehealth applications varies greatly and the need exists to upgrade the capacity overall. IHS telecommunications infrastructure must support distributed applications such as Clinical Performance Reporting (CPR), video conferencing, access to knowledge bases for clinical decision support, the important and growing field of telemedicine, and enhanced security measures. 
The purpose of the Indian Health Service’s (IHS) national data repository, National Patient Information Reporting System (NPIRS), is to provide a broad range of clinical and administrative information to managers at all levels of the Indian health system to allow them to better manage individual patients, local facilities, and regional and national programs. NPIRS, which has been in existence since 1986, has recently completed an upgrade to a new, state-of-the-art, enterprise-wide national data warehouse (NDW) system. This system provides more accurate, timely, and a broader scope of information to clinical and administrative managers throughout the Indian health system. Upon completion of this first iteration, additional new requirements will be addressed in future years, in an ongoing fashion, based upon a careful assessment of their cost, value, risk, available resources, and customer priorities. |
