HCFA administrator - Health Care Financing Administration, Thomas Scully appointment - Brief Article

Healthcare Financial Management, July, 2001

On May 29, 2001, Thomas Scully was sworn in as HCFA administrator, following Senate confirmation four days earlier. Among the challenges Scully faces is addressing the concerns of President Bush and members of Congress about HCFA's operational efficiency. As a first step, Scully said he will hold a staff contest to come up with a new name for the agency by July 1.

(In recent months, HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson had floated the idea of renaming HCFA.) Scully formerly was president and CEO of the Federation of American Hospitals (FAH) and, in the early 1990s, was an Office of Management and Budget official in President George H. W. Bush's administration. Chip Kahn, president of the Health Insurance Association of America (HIAA), announced his resignation on May 25, 2001, to replace Scully as FAH president.