The Veterans Administration maintaines this page which contains a monograph on the VistA clinical computing software: ‘…A collection of monographs has been developed as an introduction to VHA developed software that comprises a large part of our integrated hospital information systems..’ Thanks to Peter Groen for this link. This is also the first new entry in the newly created ‘VistA’ subject category.

Here’s a list of adopters of the Veterans Administration VistA software from the hardhats site which includes the Indian Health Service, The National Cancer Institute, Cairo, Helsinki University Hospital, University Hospital of Kuopio, Finland, German Heart Institute, Berlin, Obafemi Awolowo University Teaching Hospitals, Nigeria. Quite a list.

The Veterans Administration VistA clinical software now has documentation available to everyone, even people outside of the VA. You can get to it here.

OSHCA 2002 brought a slew of announcements and speakers about VistA. The following is a short guide to the VistA players as seen at OSHCA: Hardhats, OpenVistA, WorldVistA, MedSphere and The Pacific Teleheath and Technology Hui. VistA is the Veterans Administration full-featured electronic medical record which has been developed and used by the VA for decades. It is public domain and available under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Many individuals and organizations are working to get it into the private sector. OSHCA provided a good opportunity to find out who the players are and what they are contributing.

Hardhats : a group of volunteers that are available for help with installing and using the FOIA VistA code. Lots of information and history on their web site as well as an active discussion list.

OpenVistA: There is no clear URL for this organization yet. It is an organization that is creating ‘the stack’ a complete Free/Open Source version of VistA. An example would be a Linux workstation, running GT.M, which runs the FOIA VistA code.

WorldVistA: Recently incorporated entity ‘will not sell services or engage in other revenue generating project activities.’ Instead it will help coordinate and facilitate the efforts of other organizations and individuals in meeting these needs. It is working with groups such as MedSphere, OpenVistA and international organizations using VistA. Recently featured on LinuxMedNews here.

Medsphere Systems Corporation — For profit company that provides VistA configuration, deployment, support, and maintenance for domestic and international healthcare organizations. Recently featured on LinuxMedNews here.

Pacific Teleheath and Technology Hui: A joint DoD/VA venture, it ‘…conducts research, develops prototypes, demonstrates, tests, evaluates, validates, then disseminates and institutionalizes applications of technologies in support of innovative health care processes in the area of telehealth.’

Joseph Dalmolin has announced that: ‘…WorldVistA is a non-profit organization incorporated in California with the mission of furthering the cause of affordable health care
information technology worldwide.

Our current efforts are targeted to championing the use of VistA outside the VA [Veterans Administration]. Part of what we hope to achieve is to act as a coordination point for work on VistA done outside the VA, to ensure that all such software changes are available under an appropriate open-source license,
and to feed bug fixes and enhancements back to the VA for consideration
for inclusion in the VA’s VistA. Our goal is to help establish for VistA
the virtuous spiral of open source by bringing together a critical mass
of developers and users…’ The complete text of the announcement is within.

Over the last year, since the release of Sanchez GT.M on Linux, a community of VistA enthusiasts including members of the Hardhats, some of whom were involved in the original creation of VistA, representatives from IBM and HP (Compaq) and other supporters have been gathering on a regular basis to work together to port VistA to GT.M on industry standard x86 GNU Linux open source platform as well as HP Alpha/AXP Open VMS and IBM eServer iSeries (formerly AS/400) OS/400 PASE.

At the OSHCA 2001 meeting in London the idea of forming a not-for-profit organization that would act as the steward for full open-source implementation of VistA was introduced by Rick Marshall, Chris Richardson and K.S. Bhaskar, three members of this community. The original name for the organization “Health Care for Humanity” became WorldVistA and as we wrap up the latest in the series of development meetings, and given the latest discussion thread on VistA, it is both timely and synchronistic to announce the formal incorporation of WorldVistA.

WorldVistA is a non-profit organization incorporated in California with the mission of furthering the cause of affordable health care information technology worldwide.

Our current efforts are targeted to championing the use of VistA outside the VA. Part of what we hope to achieve is to act as a coordination point for work on VistA done outside the VA, to ensure that all such software changes are available under an appropriate open-source license, and to feed bug fixes and enhancements back to the VA for consideration for inclusion in the VA’s VistA. Our goal is to help establish for VistA the virtuous spiral of open source by bringing together a critical mass
of developers and users.

WorldVistA, will not sell services or engage in other revenue generating
project activities. Instead it will help coordinate and facilitate the
efforts of other organizations and individuals in meeting these needs.

We welcome and look forward to comments and suggestions from the broader
open-source health care community in helping WorldVistA evolve.