Levin Warns On NHS Open Source Approach

The former chief technology officer of the US Department of Veterans Affairs has warned that NHS England’s bid to bring open source to the health service will fail without a central authority to curate it.

Peter Levin, whose achievements at the VA included helping to create that Blue Button initiative, which gives patients an easy way to view and download their personal health records, was hired by NHS England to advise on managing open source development.

He was part of an NHS working group that looked at the potential for bringing an Open Source Electronic Health Record Agent or Osehra vision for VistA to the UK.

OSEHRA is a US not-for-profit organisation that aims to create a “vendor neutral community for the creation, evaluation, promotion and support for an open source electronic health record."