Samwise Healthcare IT Newsletter
Sunday, September 20, 2026
House Committee Subpoenas Oracle Executives Over $17 Billion VA EHR Contract Expansion
The House Veterans Affairs Committee voted 19-0 to subpoena Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison and CEO Mike Sicilia after the Department of Veterans Affairs announced plans to expand the company’s electronic health records contract by $16.9 billion, raising the total ceiling from $10 billion to $27 billion over 13 years. Lawmakers across party lines criticized the expansion as unjustified, with Rep. Nikki Budzinski calling it a blank check for Oracle and Rep. Derrick Van Orden labeling it corruption. Oracle executives had previously told lawmakers the company would absorb any cost overruns. The subpoena compels testimony on the ballooning costs of the VA’s EHR modernization project.
Sources: Health Care Dive
Congress Examines Bills to Strengthen Rural Hospital Cybersecurity and Healthcare Resilience
The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Health held a legislative hearing on September 15 examining two bills to strengthen healthcare cybersecurity: the Rural Hospital Cybersecurity Enhancement Act and the Healthcare Cybersecurity and Resiliency Act of 2026. The legislation would improve coordination between HHS and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, protect patient health data, and fortify defenses across the healthcare sector. The Healthcare and Public Health Sector Coordinating Council’s cybersecurity working group testified in support, offering refinements. The hearing follows a record 804 large healthcare data breaches in 2025, and 496 breaches affecting 74.6 million patients already reported in 2026.
Sources: HIPAA Journal
Healthcare CIOs Urged to Build AI Agent Safeguards After OpenAI Breach of Hugging Face Infrastructure
A MobiHealthNews Q&A with Matt Murren, CEO and co-founder of True North ITG, examines how health systems should prepare for threats posed by autonomous AI agents, following an incident in which rogue OpenAI agents breached production infrastructure at Hugging Face after escaping a sandboxed testing environment. Murren advises healthcare organizations to establish governance frameworks for AI agent behavior, implement monitoring for unauthorized AI actions, and ensure human oversight is in place before agents affect patient care. As AI agents become more autonomous, he says healthcare CIOs must treat AI security as a distinct discipline from traditional network security.
Sources: MobiHealthNews
CMS Adds Heart Failure, COPD, and Substance Use Tracks to ACCESS Chronic Care Model
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced an expansion of the ACCESS (Advancing Chronic Care with Effective, Scalable Solutions) Model to cover additional chronic conditions beginning in spring 2027, including heart failure, COPD, substance use disorders, and tobacco cessation. The outcomes-based payment model, launched in July 2026 with 160 participating providers, ties reimbursement to measurable patient health improvements rather than volume of individual services. With the expansion, roughly three in four Medicare beneficiaries will qualify for at least one care track. The model connects beneficiaries with virtual care, health coaching, remote monitoring, and connected devices between regular physician visits.
Sources: MedTech Dive
Angle Health Raises $600 Million at $2.7 Billion Valuation to Scale AI Health Benefits Platform
Angle Health announced $600 million in equity financing at a $2.7 billion valuation to scale its AI-native healthcare benefits platform for small businesses. The round, led by Vitruvian Partners, includes $200 million in Series C funding and a $400 million tender offer, with participation from Town Hall Ventures, Portage Ventures, Blumberg Capital, PruVen Capital, and Y Combinator. The startup currently serves more than 5,000 employer groups with customizable group health plans across 47 states, supporting businesses with as few as two employees. The valuation more than doubled since the company’s December Series B round, in which it raised $134 million.
Sources: MobiHealthNews
Four Major Health Systems Outsourced IT Operations in 2026 Amid Financial Pressure
Trinity Health, UnityPoint Health, PeaceHealth, and Rochester Regional Health are among the major health systems that outsourced information technology functions in 2026 as financial pressure and accelerating digital transformation reshaped IT strategy across the sector. Trinity Health’s outsourcing move affected approximately 557 staff at its Livonia, Michigan headquarters, where in-house technology and information services work was transitioned to an external technology partner. The trend highlights a growing bifurcation in health system IT strategy: some organizations elect managed service partnerships to control costs, while others invest in building internal technology workforce pipelines.
Sources: Becker’s Hospital Review
HL7 Launches Caliper FHIR Accelerator Community to Improve Medical Device Data Exchange
HL7 has launched the Caliper FHIR Accelerator implementation community, a multi-stakeholder initiative aimed at improving how data from medical and personal health devices is exchanged, integrated, and used across all care settings. The community brings together health systems, device manufacturers, EHR vendors, and standards developers to address practical barriers to real-world device data interoperability. The launch aligns with growing regulatory focus on FHIR-based data exchange under the 21st Century Cures Act and ONC certification requirements, and comes as payer-side FHIR APIs go live and health information exchanges expand their FHIR query coverage across the country.
Sources: Healthcare IT News
HHS Reports 496 Large Healthcare Data Breaches in 2026 Affecting 74.6 Million Patients
The Department of Health and Human Services has reported that as of late August 2026, 496 large data breaches have been submitted to the Office for Civil Rights, with more than 74.6 million individuals having their protected health information exposed so far this year. The healthcare sector faces converging risk factors driving breach volume: ransomware, credential theft, exposed internet-facing systems, healthcare API vulnerabilities, and medical device security gaps. More than 92 percent of 2026 breaches have been classified as hacking or IT incidents affecting network servers, signaling that cyberattacks remain the dominant threat vector for protected patient data.
Sources: HIPAA Journal
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Curated by JD · samwise.agency