ACCELERATE INNOVATION
Curbing the growth of healthcare spending is best done through innovation. We serve as both a promoter and supporter of new healthcare innovations in the state and welcome ideas to support your efforts. We address challenges that come with innovation, including lack of awareness, lack of partners, lack of reliable data to demonstrate value, and lack of funding.
WAYS WE CAN SUPPORT
Promote
We bring broad awareness to innovations to inspire replication, enhancements, and expanded participation.
Assist
We support innovators to succeed and scale through data analysis, advice on market and policy barriers, and introductions that can forge new synergistic partnerships.
Convene
We convene multi-stakeholder initiatives and provide a trusted setting to achieve collective solutions.
Innovations We Support
We support healthcare innovation by promoting new ideas, assisting with data and partnerships, and convening stakeholders to drive collective solutions. Through these efforts, we help innovators overcome barriers and scale their impact across Utah’s healthcare system.
Get Healthy Utah
Get Healthy Utah works to create healthier communities by promoting active living, healthy eating, and overall well-being.
Digital Health Interoperability Pilot
The One Utah Health Collaborative, in partnership with Governor Spencer Cox and Leavitt Partners, is leading Utah’s Digital Health Interoperability Pilot.
Shoreline Health
Shoreline Health provides standardized educational materials with quick, easy to access videos, on cancer diagnosis to patients and their support system.
Colorectal Cancer Screenings
The Colllaborative’s Colorectal Cancer Screening prevention initiative is aimed at improving early detection and preventive care across Utah.
Population Health Center (UofU Health)
The University of Utah’s Population Health Center in Rose Park offers integrated healthcare that addresses physical, mental, and oral health, along with social challenges like housing and food insecurity.
Vamos Health
Vamos Health is a network of primary care clinics designed to expand access to and provide high quality, culturally competent care to the Spanish speaking community.
USARA
USARA's Utah Recovery Friendly Workplace Initiative supports businesses in creating environments that assist employees facing substance use disorder (SUD).
Project Embrace
Project Embrace provides access to unused medical supplies and equipment for underserved communities, reducing waste while improving healthcare access.
Innovation for Justice (i4J)
Innovation for Justice (i4J) is a social justice lab housed at the University of Arizona and the University of Utah.
Featured Innovations
Digital Health Interoperability Pilot
Description
The Collaborative, in partnership with Governor Spencer Cox and Leavitt Partners, launched a statewide public-private initiative to advance digital health interoperability and drive real-world applications of modern data-sharing technology in healthcare. Since its launch at the Utah State Capitol in April 2023, the Digital Health Interoperability Pilot has engaged more than a dozen organizations in testing solutions that reduce administrative burdens, empower patients, and improve healthcare data exchange.
The pilot envisions a future where providers, payers, and individuals can seamlessly access and share clinical and claims data—without needing multiple portals or creating extra burdens for providers and patients. By leveraging HL7® FHIR® APIs, Utah is advancing federal interoperability efforts, including TEFCA and CMS rules, to make healthcare data more connected and accessible.
Building on this progress, the pilot is now shifting from testing to actual implementation, reinforcing Utah’s leadership in modernizing health data exchange.
Goals and Objectives
The workgroup has prioritized six key strategies to enhance health data exchange and reduce administrative burdens:
✅ Clinical Data Exchange – Seamless patient record sharing across providers & payers
✅ Prior Authorization – Faster approvals to reduce delays in care
✅ FHIR API Endpoint Directory – Simplified discovery of health data connections
✅ Digital Identity Federation – Secure authentication for patient access
✅ Digital Insurance Card – Easy digital access to insurance details
✅ Public Health Data Modernization – Strengthening statewide health data infrastructure
By advancing federal interoperability frameworks (TEFCA, CMS, and ONC guidelines), Utah continues to drive healthcare innovation and efficiency statewide.
Preventing Colon Cancer
Description
Screen Utah is a statewide effort uniting Utah’s major health systems, medical groups, payers, community partners, and public health agencies to strengthen colorectal cancer screening and ensure every Utahn can access the right test at the right time. Colorectal cancer remains one of the most preventable causes of cancer‑related death, yet screening rates in Utah have declined in recent years. To reverse this trend, more than two dozen organizations committed to a shared statewide goal: increasing screening rates by 3–5% over three years while improving clarity, cost predictability, and the patient experience.
Through structured Progress Forums and cross‑sector workgroups, partners are addressing barriers that no single organization can solve alone. Screen Utah continues to advance this shared work by supporting implementation, monitoring statewide screening rates, and helping organizations adopt consistent, patient‑centered practices.
Featured Resources
- Progress Report (March 2026) — Updates on implementation, measurable actions, and emerging themes.
- Case Study — Lessons learned, early successes, and the Collaborative’s role in accelerating statewide progress.
- Clinical Workflow & Implementation Guidance — Practical tools to support consistent care delivery, referrals, documentation, and follow‑up.
- Coverage & Benefit Guidance — Recommendations to improve clarity and consistency in CRC screening coverage, coding, and benefit design.
- Early Action Report (March 2025) — Initial commitments and shared areas of focus that established Utah’s statewide CRC screening strategy.
Innovation Advisory Board
What is the IAB? The IAB is an appointed group of individuals who review requests for the Collaborative to support innovation projects. We are honored to have this distinguished committee as a part of the Collaborative.
Roles and Responsibilities
- Monitor the state landscape for health-related needs, drivers of healthcare costs, and health inequities
- Seek out and identify innovations across the state
- Design and maintain an innovation portfolio that guides the allocation of resources
- Create and apply a framework to review innovation requests and provide recommendations on how the Collaborative can best support applicants
- Advise the Collaborative on what activities to undertake to further promote and inspire innovation in the state
INNOVATION ADVISORY
BOARD MEMBERS
BOARD MEMBERS
Dan McMaster, Chairman
Managing Director, Corporate VenturesÂ
Solventum (formerly 3M Health Care)
Brent James M.D., M.Stat. FACPE
Clinical Professor, Clinical
Excellence Research Center
(CERC), Dept of Medicine Stanford
University School of Medicine
Katie Swenson
DMSc, MBA, PA-C, Executive Clinical Director, Surgical Specialties-Digestive Health Clinical Program
Current Priority Areas
The Collaborative supports all forms of health innovation. Through a public input process, the Collaborative identified the following four areas as having an outsized impact in achieving our goals. The Collaborative prioritizes innovations and initiatives that align with these areas:​
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Primary Care - Utahns have and use access to preventative and primary care
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Behavioral Health - Utahns have intuitive access to integrated Behavioral health care
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Data infrastructure - Utahns personal health records are fully available to them and to those who care for them to improve health outcomes and reduce the expense of duplicate care
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Coverage Areas - Utahns have appropriate health insurance coverage to access the health services they need
LEARN MORE
If you would like to learn more about the IAB's work please email info@utahhealthcollaborative.org