IBM, Epic Already Prepping For Military EHR Work

Though the Department of Defense is months away from making an award in its $11 billion electronic health record contract, IBM and health record partner Epic are busy prepping to start work on plans to transform the way the military provides health care to service members and their families. The IBM team has plenty of competition from other teams of top federal technology integrators and electronic health records providers. But since announcing its bid back in June 2014, IBM has been exuding confidence that its team is in the best position to land the deal and execute the military's vision for a new health care system.

"For IBM this is a grand challenge that comes once in a decade, or once in a century," said Andy Maner, head of IBM Federal Services in a roundtable with reporters. "One of the things that we wanted to do was to establish a path of work, really over the last year, so that if and when ... we are awarded it, we are ready to go on day one."

The Defense Healthcare Management Systems Modernization program calls for an initial capability to be in place in 2016. According to Maner, that aggressive timetable requires the pre-award activity. IBM has installed an Epic Foundation system -- a starter configuration offered by Epic to new customers -- on a secure, IBM-operated data center at the Allegany Ballistics Laboratory in West Virginia...