The best thing the VA has going for it is VistA, it’s universal electronic record system.
I have used it extensively as a medical student and resident, and it works well. If the government were serious about implementing electronic records, it would install and support physicians for using VistA completely free of charge.
Instead, they’re killing it. Yeah, doesn’t make sense to me either.
Related posts:
- VistA: Holding health IT back?
- Pie in the sky and electronic records
- My take: CPOE, VistA, doctor rating websites
- The low adoption rate of electronic records
- Electronic records and economic sense
- An Epidemic of Meddling
- How to fund electronic medical records wisely
KevinMD.com on Facebook
{ 2 comments }
DOD can use their own system and still have automated medical records ……
Think of VistA as “proof of concept” for the idea. Dod believes that, but now they’ll do it so it works for them.
I have no problem believing that their cost-benefit analysis works out so they’d decide to implement their own system rather than retro-fit VistA.
Outsourced defense is nothing new. Flash back to Eisenhower warning of the Military-Industrial complex! Agencies desiring integrated systems at the expense of in-place smaller systems is not unique to the current administration. Al Gore’s government re-invention spawned dozens of big projects like this.
The important thing is that they’re getting on the health IT bandwagon.
Check out BlinkMD, cool company out of Pensacola, Florida. Heard of them through DOD. Innovative GUI, health data exchange.
Comments on this entry are closed.