​The Department of Health and Human Services issued an electronic health records contracting guide Monday to help health care providers avoid buying technologies or services that may ultimately prevent or limit their ability to share patient data with other systems.

The head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services visited the West Coast this week to pitch Silicon Valley startups to innovate around Medicaid.

After three completed open-enrollment periods, the first of which resulted in a calamitous rollout of the Affordable Care Act in 2013, Healthcare.gov still faces an uphill battle of technical improvements, a government watchdog said in an audit released Tuesday.

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services wants to make it easier for vendors to get involved in modernizing Medicaid IT systems across the country through a series of new initiatives, according to acting Administrator Andy Slavitt.