DOD releases theater AHLTA to open source community

The Defense Department has put the theater version of its AHLTA clinical information system into the open source community that is supporting the development of the joint electronic health record (iEHR) to serve DOD and the Veterans Affairs Department. Open source will take an important role in the development of the iEHR, said Dr. Karen Guice, the principal deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Health Affairs and the Military Health System’s CIO.

The software code for the theater AHLTA is available now for download at the Open Source Electronic Health Record Agent (OSEHRA). DOD is also preparing plans to test development and program milestone activities for iEHR readiness at its facilities in Richmond, Va., and Kihei, Maui, HI, including the pharmacy and immunization pieces that will make up the capabilities of the first slice of the iEHR.

“Our challenge is converging two very different departments that operate under separate law and authorities and policies and directions,” she said at the June 11 Government Health IT conference sponsored by HIMSS. Once VA and DOD begin to deploy applications and capabilities for the iEHR, “we will implement fairly quickly, and we need to make sure that something doesn’t break,” Guice said...