DoD, VA Will Use Service-Oriented Architecture in Joint EHR

The ever-evolving, contentious effort to merge the electronic health records of the Department of Defense and the Veterans Affairs Department just took another step forward. Mark Goodge, chief technology officer of the Military Health System, announced that the integrated electronic health record (iEHR) will use common services applications rather than a single proprietary system, according to Government Health IT.

The iEHR will use standards, applications, databases and middleware based on common services and a web-based interface. The common services will be able to operate with the current AHLTA (DoD) and VistA (VA) EHRs, as well as components of the iEHR when they're available...