He was honored as one of the Top 8 Chief Information Officers in North America, for which he received the Elite 8 Award.
WEST CHESTER, PA, May 20, 2024 /24-7PressRelease/ — Joseph Smith has been included in Marquis Who’s Who. As in all Marquis Who’s Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
Upon earning a Bachelor of Science in industrial management from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1971, Mr. Smith received an MBA in finance and financial management services from Loyola University Chicago. During his graduate studies, he met several people who worked for Blue Cross Blue Shield. After graduating, he initially joined BCBS Illinois, followed by the Blue Cross Association, then onto Independence Blue Cross as the vice president of claims before transferring his skillset to Arkansas Blue Cross Blue Shield. Between 1993 and his retirement in 2014, Mr. Smith excelled as the chief information officer and senior vice president. Backed by his considerable expertise in the healthcare and information technology industries, he played a vital role in building the Inter-Plan system, communicating all BCBS’s some 75 Local Plans for healthcare claims, and enabling members to take advantage of Local BCBS Plans’ contracted discounts. After implementation, this Inter-Plan System enabled huge BCBS aggregate membership net growth of more than 34,000,000 Subscribers to its base; moving to a little over 100,000,000 Subscribers in America. Subsequently, in the 1990’s, Mr. Smith was the chief IT Architect, who along with ABCBS Executive Mgt., worked with 2 hospital systems in Arkansas, to build America’s 1st fully-integrated Health Information Exchange (known as AHIN). This system integrated the administrative, financial, and clinical transactions required to enable most healthcare services for all healthcare players, enabling hospitals, physicians, all payors, and more to exchange information electronically. During his tenure, Mr. Smith was also invited by Dr. David Brailer (who worked directly for President George W. Bush as the national coordinator for Health Information Technology) to help develop the national health information technology strategy.
While at Arkansas BCBS, Mr. Smith was also the founder, chairman, and president of Shareware LLC, a shared capabilities company currently owned by ten Blue Cross Blue Shield Plans, and the founder of Shared Health Plan Systems LLC, through which he established the first vendor-supplied multi-tenant health plan operations platform.
Given his professional accomplishments, he was honored to receive numerous national information technology awards individually and for Arkansas BCBS, including the Hospital and Health Network’s Top 10 Most Wired Health Plans in America Award and the Arkansas Business’s Best Insurance Website Award. He was honored as one of the Top 8 Chief Information Officers in North America, for which he received the Elite 8 Award. While his career has been filled with many highlights, Mr. Smith is most proud of the above-mentioned award because his CIO peers chose him for the recognition. Similarly, he obtained a domestic patent for developing a business and information technology strategy and supporting computer systems for Health Plans to undertake a massive Healthcare Industry conversion from the ICD 9 coding nomenclature to a “10 times more granular” ICD 10 coding nomenclature, which was a massive industry-wide mission critical conversion. This migration was critical because these ICD 9 & 10 coding structures drive nearly all the insured healthcare financial transactions that occur in the healthcare industry.
Backed by more than 40 years of industry experience, Mr. Smith established HITvision in 2014, focusing on bettering the healthcare industry by utilizing information technology. As chief executive officer, he has established connections with governments and private sector healthcare organizations worldwide, including Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Czech Republic, England, Austria, Germany, India, and more, working to apply Healthcare IT functionalities to their respective healthcare systems. Outside of his work, Mr. Smith is a member of the board of advisors for several technology firms across America, and he has served at the Dr. Louis Sullivan Institute for Healthcare Innovation.
Driven to leverage his IT knowledge, Mr. Smith aligned himself with the American Arbitration Association to assist the AAA’s Arbitration process in case disputes associated with IT capabilities. Looking ahead, Ms. Smith intends to continue helping others and imparting his knowledge to industry up-and-comers.
About Marquis Who’s Who®:
Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who’s Who in America®, Marquis Who’s Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Marquis celebrates its 125th anniversary in 2023, and Who’s Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. Marquis® publications may be visited at the official Marquis Who’s Who® website at www.marquiswhoswho.com.
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