U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)

See the following -

New V.A. Secretary Says Hiring Spree Is Needed To Meet Patient Demand

Richard A. Oppel | The New York Times | September 8, 2014

The new secretary of Veterans Affairs said Monday that the department needed to hire “tens of thousands of new doctors, new nurses, new clinicians” — emphasizing the significance of a shortage of employees who are directly involved in treating patients, a factor many experts said was a main driver in the waiting-list scandal that rocked the agency this year...

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New VA Secretary Sets Sights On Major Agency Reforms

Dan Verton | FedScoop | September 8, 2014

Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert McDonald outlined for the first time Monday his strategic vision for a new, efficient and innovative VA that is no longer hamstrung by old-fashioned hierarchy and a complex maze of websites and systems that prevent veterans from accessing VA medical services...

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NHS England Open Source Plans Revealed

Rebecca Todd | E-Health Insider | March 3, 2014

NHS England is looking to create a series of community interest companies to act as custodians for open source products introduced to the NHS.  NHS England revealed in mid-2013 that it wanted to encourage an open source option for trusts looking to invest in electronic patient record systems, and that some of the £260m ‘Safer Hospitals Safer Wards: Technology Fund’ would go towards this.

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NIH And VA Address Pain And Related Conditions In U.S. Military Personnel, Veterans, And Their Families

Press Release | National Institutes of Health , Department of Veterans Affairs | September 25, 2014

Thirteen research projects totaling approximately $21.7 million over 5 years will explore nondrug approaches to managing pain and related health conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), drug abuse, and sleep issues. The effort seeks to enhance options for the management of pain and associated problems in U.S. military personnel, veterans, and their families...

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NIH to Bring Precision Medicine Data Collection to Patient Homes

Jennifer Bresnick | HealthIT Analytics | April 6, 2017

Thousands of volunteers for the All of Us precision medicine cohort won’t even have to leave the comfort of their living rooms when contributing data to the project thanks to a new NIH collaboration with mobile medical service EMSI. The All of Us program, formally known as the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI) Cohort, aims to collect biosamples from at least one million patients to fuel big data analytics and personalized medicine research...

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Nineteen VA Medical Centers runing VistA EHR System make Joint Commission's Top Performer List

Press Release | WSJ MarketWatch | October 11, 2012

Nineteen Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities from across the Nation were recently recognized by The Joint Commission as top performers on key health care quality measures for 2011/2012. Read More »

No New VA Patient Scheduling System Until 2016

Bob Brewin | Nextgov.com | July 24, 2014

The Department of Veterans Affairs will not field a new patient scheduling system to replace its existing system until 2016, Acting VA Secretary Sloan Gibson told a House VA committee hearing today...

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No New VA Patient Scheduling System Until 2020 (Updated)

Bob Brewin | Nextgov.com | September 26, 2014

...The Department of Veterans Affairs will not install a new patient scheduling system to all of its 153 hospitals and 50,000 users until 2020, according to contract documents released last week...

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Obama Should Act Immediately On Veterans' Healthcare, AMA Delegates Agree

Andis Robeznieks | Modern Healthcare | June 10, 2014

President Barack Obama should take immediate action to allow veterans to seek care outside of the Veterans Affairs Department's healthcare system, the American Medical Association House of Delegates resolved Tuesday. It also recommended that state and local medical societies and local VA offices create registries of doctors willing to provide immediate veteran care....

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Obama’s Pick For Ebola Czar Comes Under Fire

Dan Verton | FedScoop | October 17, 2014

...Obama’s appointment Friday of Ebola czar Ron Klain, a career lawyer and political loyalist with limited federal project management skills and no experience managing a public health crisis, invokes images of the Bush-era response to Hurricane Katrina led by former Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Michael Brown, another career lawyer whose only significant management experience up until Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast was as a commissioner for the International Arabian Horse Association...

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Oh No: Obama Once Again Talks About 'Sacred Trust' With Vets

Bob Brewin | Nextgov.com | August 28, 2014

Speaking at the American Legion convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, this Tuesday, President Obama invoked the “sacred trust” between those who serve in the military, the citizens they defend and himself.  Obama proclaimed, “The bond between our forces and our citizens has to be a sacred trust, and that for me, for my administration, upholding our trust with our veterans is not just a matter of policy, it is a moral obligation.”...

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OMB Turns To The People-Solution To Fix Troubled IT Programs

Jason Miller | Federal News Radio | September 15, 2014

...Steve VanRoekel, the federal chief information officer, detailed two specific initiatives under the agenda's smarter IT delivery area to address the technical expertise of federal employees. One is around flexible hiring, and a second is trying another employee exchange program...

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On Gulf War's 25th Anniversary, Researchers & Veterans Say VA Failing to Treat Gulf War Syndrome

Press Release | Veterans for Common Sense | February 23, 2016

Gulf War veterans and researchers of Gulf War Illness – termed the "signature" injury of the 1991 Gulf War in a recent government-sponsored report – will provide sharp criticism of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) during a Congressional hearing Congress on Tuesday, just hours before the precise 25th anniversary of the 1991 Gulf War's decisive liberation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation...

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On the Road

Over the past few months, I’ve been in England, China, Denmark, New Zealand, and Canada. Each of them is rethinking their healthcare IT strategy and is not entirely satisfied with past progress. I’m often asked by senior government officials to help harmonize IT strategy at the country level. That I can do. I’m also asked to discuss the US Presidential campaign, but that defies rational explanation. I frequently say that healthcare IT issues are the same all over the world. Here’s a few common observations..

ONC Unveils Blue Button Campaign, Toolkit During Health IT Week

Staff Writer | iHealthBeat | September 16, 2014

On Monday, National Coordinator for Health IT Karen DeSalvo kicked off National Health IT Week by announcing an upcoming Blue Button campaign that will focus on consumers' access to their personal health data, FierceHealthIT reports...

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