Wired news has a mass-media article on an Archives of Internal Medicine report about high rates of adverse drug effects in a hospital that is highly computerized. From the Wired article: ‘…At the Salt Lake City hospital, for instance, health workers ordered the wrong drugs, ordered the wrong doses and failed to monitor patients properly. Ninety-one percent of the 483 mishaps were moderately harmful, and 9 percent were serious, according to the researchers…If you think your own neighborhood hospital might do a better job than the hospital in the study, think again. Sure, the Salt Lake City facility is part of the frequently maligned VA system. But VA hospitals are widely lauded for their advanced medical technology and commitment to reducing medical errors.

Continue reading →

There is an article in Medical Economics about the possibilities of privatization of the Veterans Administration VistA software. It has some laughably erroneous quotes in it which are fortunately partly rebutted in the article such as: ‘…Mark R. Anderson, a consultant with the AC Group in Montgomery, TX, is skeptical that the VistA-Office EHR will be as inexpensive as CMS claims. The main problem, he says, is that it uses the MUMPS programming language, rather than Windows. Even though a Windows “front end” can be grafted onto the MUMPS system, making the screens look like Windows screens, a small business computer server can’t run the software, he says. “Any PC can access a MUMPS operating system. But who’s going to maintain that server with the MUMPS operating database? You’ve got to buy a big mainframe server that costs $50,000 to $100,000 to run the system.” VistA will also need special interfaces to outside applications that run on Windows, including practice management and laboratory systems, he maintains…’ Thanks to Kevin Toppenberg for this link.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced that WorldVistA has been named ‘…as a vendor support organization to provide vendor training on the VistA-Office EHR….’ Aside from injecting much-needed funds into the Free and Open Source VistA software effort what does it all mean? Linux Medical News interviewed WorldVistA director Joseph Dal Molin about the announcement. The complete interview is below. The facts at a glance are: 1) Approximately $900,000 awarded for training VistA vendors. 2) The training will be free. 3) Training dates should begin in late August or early September and will be complete by January 2006. 4) Two training tracks will be available, one for those with no VistA experience and one for those with some experience. 5) Training locations will be announced but will likely be held once each in the East, Central and Western United States.

Continue reading →

According to an announcement on Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) website:
‘…CMS, through the Iowa Foundation for Medical Care as its contractor to support the VistA-Office EHR project, has established WorldVistA (link to www.worldvista.org) as a vendor support organization to provide vendor training on VistA-Office EHR. WorldVistA�s mission is to improve health by making medical software better and more affordable. WorldVistA, incorporated in 2002 as a nonprofit corporation will provide training sessions to vendors beginning in September 2005, shortly after version 1.0 is released to the public. WorldVistA will also convene conferences and establish a website where training information will be available…’ Thanks to Nancy Anthracite for the link. More information will follow as it occurs.