Meadows, Finn Named to HHS’ Cybersecurity Task Force

On Thursday, Theresa Meadows and David Finn were appointed to serve on the HHS’ Health Care Industry Cybersecurity Task Force, an initiative that was mandated by the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015.

Meadows is SVP and CIO at Cook Children’s Health Care System, and Finn is Health IT Officer at Symantec Corp. Both are “highly qualified” to assume the new role, says CHIME President and CEO Russell Branzell.

“David brings a wealth of knowledge to the table and will be able to share insights from a broad industry perspective. Theresa is one of the most forward-thinking CIOs in the industry. She has more than 20 years of experience facilitating change across large healthcare enterprises,” he noted. “Both David and Theresa understand the immense challenges healthcare organizations face in protecting patient data and minimizing the risk of a cyberattack.”

The HHS task force is charged with analyzing the unique security challenges and barriers facing healthcare organizations. It will also study how other industries are protecting data. The task force must develop a plan for sharing information among healthcare stakeholders, including the federal government, and is scheduled to issue a report to Congress in the next year.

“The government cannot solve this problem alone, nor can the private sector,” said Finn, who has held both CIO and Security Officer roles on the provider side. “It is absolutely critical to have collaboration in addressing cybersecurity across all sectors. Data breaches, ransomware, hacks and other threats negatively impact everyone and everyone must come together to solve those problems.”

Meadows, who has been with Cook Children’s since 2010, was recently elected to CHIME’s Board of Trustees. She has served on the planning committee for the Fall CIO Forum in 2014 and 2015 and the CHCIO item review panel, and has been a member of the CHIME Professional Development Committee.