Here Comes the Navy Pharmacy System

Even though the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments just kicked off the procurement process for a joint pharmacy information system as part of the integrated electronic health record, I have picked up strong signals that the Navy Bureau of Medicine plans to develop its own pharmacy system over the next couple of years.

Why? Because various Navy hospitals have installed different systems from a number of vendors on a standalone basis and the service needs a new system to serve its hospitals well before the initial iEHR pharmacy deployment at two pilot sites in 2014 -- a deployment that includes the Navy hospital in Portsmouth, VA.