The Health Care Financing Administration (new name: Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services-CMS) participates in the Dept. of Health and Human Services’ Data Council (See: http://aspe.os.dhhs.gov/datacncl/), the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics (see http://www.ncvhs.hhs.gov) and in the ANSI HISB/HITSP. Within the ANSI HITSP, HCFA/CMS is providing support for the development of the US Health Information Knowledgebase (USHIK) which will catalog the data elements used in US national Health Informatics Standards, including the Administrative Simplification functions of the Health Insurance  Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).  This catalog will also be expanded to include information on common model conventions relevant to informatics standards in healthcare.