VistA

Most of the hospitals I write about go with big, expensive commercial EMR packages and suffer through upgrades and code fix schedules imposed by the vendor.  The process seems pretty miserable, and rather inefficient, but IT departments are stuck with it. That being said, at least some hospitals take advantage of the open source paradigm, including the following midwestern facility. Read More »

Oracle Corp. put out a 19-page white paper last month that pilloried the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments for thinking open source software can save money...The white paper zeroed in on the now aborted effort to develop a Defense-VA integrated electronic health record as a prime example of the billions that can be wasted on an open source project – even though the Pentagon has historically resisted using VA’s...VistA system. Read More »

...With a growing population and an increase in the number of patients, the pressure on doctors and hospital staff has increased drastically in the last decade. It has become very difficult for a physician to track a patient's medical history (including past visit information, lab results, previous medications, and drug allergies) through a traditional system. Read More »

The Defense and Veterans Affairs departments will use existing DoD facilities in Richmond, Va., and on Hawaii’s island of Maui to develop and test components of a new $4 billion integrated electronic health record (iEHR) system. The centers, to be opened at DoD’s joint information technology centers there by Oct. 1, are a key step in the departments’ effort to make active-duty military members’ electronic health records accessible to VA doctors, and to have vets’ records accessible to VA and other health care providers. Read More »

Over 17,000 nurses, allied health professionals and Health Information Management students to gain hands-on access to iCare for EHR training from the Center for Healthcare Innovation at The College of St. Scholastica Read More »

Medical students returning from rotations at Veterans’ Administration Hospitals often rave about how good VistA is – something I have never heard with any other EHR. While I have not used it in clinical care, I have examined the demonstration client available on the web and been impressed by the simple, clean interface – quite unlike most other EHRs I have used or seen. Read More »

Implementation of vxVistA to improve care delivery, enhance patient outcomes for New York-based mental health care patients Read More »