Micky Tripathi, the former assistant secretary for technology policy at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and National Coordinator for Health IT, has reportedly accepted a new post overseeing artificial intelligence at Mayo Clinic.
A representative from Mayo Clinic confirmed Monday by email that Tripathi has been appointed as the health system’s chief AI implementation officer, though no further statement is available at this time.
In May last year, HHS chose Tripathi to serve as its acting chief AI officer and reorganized technology offices to standardize how divisions across the department invest in and use AI for federal healthcare services and programs.
The department then announced that its Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT, the Assistant Secretary for Administration, and the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response would consolidate in July.
Before Tripathi left his post in January, HHS published an AI Strategic Plan, with guidance for healthcare, public health and human services. The plan, no longer available on the ASTP website, aimed to coordinate a public-private approach to improve “the quality, safety, efficiency, accessibility, equitability and outcomes in health and human services through the innovative, safe and responsible use of AI.”
We’ve reached out to the agency to request an update on the plan’s status.
Tripathi also had a role in nurturing the healthcare industry-led Coalition for Healthcare AI (CHAI) from a government partnership perspective. He stepped down last year after HHS named him acting chief AI officer, citing new potential conflicts of interest.
CHAI, which has stated that its purpose was to unite regulators and developers to drive AI standards, released an open-source healthcare AI nutrition label model card in January. The coalition said it created the card after a concerted multi-stakeholder effort to build consensus around “responsible AI,” including agreed-upon technology evaluation metrics for performance, fairness and bias.
According to CHAI’s CEO Brian Anderson, sections of the label go above and beyond the HHS Health Data, Technology, and Interoperability: Certification Program Updates, Algorithm Transparency, and Information Sharing Final Rule. Tripathi brought that interoperability rule, which he told Healthcare IT News increased the transparency behind the use of AI in clinical decision support tools, to the finish line last year.
This article was updated April 14, 2025, to reflect a statement from Mayo Clinic.
Andrea Fox is senior editor of Healthcare IT News.
Email: afox@himss.org
Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.
