The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT has appointed Lana Moriarty to be the new head of its Consumer eHealth division.

[See also: ONC's Ricciardi gives consumers voice]

She succeeds Lygeia Ricciardi, who pioneered the position in 2012. Ricciardi stepped down earlier this summer; Moriarty, who was appointed Sept. 11, will serve as acting director for consumer e-health, working within ONC's Office of Programs & Engagement.

Prior to her arrival at ONC, Moriarty worked in HHS' Health Resources and Services Administration, where she helped oversee its National Health Service Corps and NURSE Corps programs.

Before that, she was an operations analyst at the World Bank and has served as a rural community development volunteer at the Peace Corps, working in West Africa.

In an email to ONC staff, Office of Programs & Engagement Director Kimberly Lynch noted that Moriarty's experience with HIV/AIDS education and prevention in Benin and Togo, her commitment to addressing gender issues while at the World Bank and her work helping underserved communities here at home with NHSC clinicians, "will help us here at ONC as we move forward with the goal of increasing consumer engagement and fostering stronger patient-provider partnerships."

On Monday, Moriarty was introduced by National Coordinator Karen DeSalvo, MD, during the day-long 2014 Consumer Health IT Summit in Washington, D.C., part of National Health IT Week. (It's live-streaming here until 3 p.m.)

To coincide with National Health IT Week, HIMSS is touting a new white paper, "The State of Patient Engagement in 2014," which examines six aspects of consumer health.

1. Emerging learnings in patient engagement
2. Patients' readiness to be engaged
3. How changes health financing affect consumers' and providers' behavior
4. How patients and providers can co-enable engagement
5. What big data means for patient engagement
6. How to make it easier for patients to engage

"Forces in the market, the workplace, demographics, and public policy are fast-converging to compel people to take on the role of health 'consumer,'" says health economist Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, editor of the white paper, in a press statement.

"Information and communications technologies support people in taking on the broad range of health consumer responsibilities: as savvy shopper for insurance, services and products; as an information-gatherer for health issues; as a self-tracker for fitness and managing medical conditions; and in self-care to take on more DIY care at home, both for prevention and for care management."