VistA e-prescribing module is now open source

Oroville Hospital in California has made the e-prescribing module it created for the Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture (VistA) open source, making it available for free to any private organization that uses VistA.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs developed the open source electronic health record system VistA, but had no need to connect to private pharmacies, according to an announcement. That led Oroville to develop the module called eRx VistA, which went live in September 2010. According to Oroville, eRx VistA can be used as a stand-alone module or as part of a VistA distribution...

With electronic prescribing part of the Meaningful Use Stage 2 requirements, the VA could use the model to make the VistA system compliant. In June, the VA and the Department of Defense issued a request for information on adding a pharmacy component to the joint EHR system they're building...