Health Technology

Coast Guard completes MHS Genesis deployment

The U.S. Coast Guard has completed its rollout of the military's new commercial electronic health record system, following a long journey that was paused during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • By Lauren C. Williams

Speed bumps for VA's new scheduling system

A watchdog report identified gaps in training and oversight for the new scheduling system being implemented at VA medical facilities.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

Morale plunges at site of VA's new electronic health record

A survey conducted by the Department of Veterans Affairs found plummeting morale at the Mann-Grandstaff VA Medical Center arising from the adoption of a new electronic health record system.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

VA seeks full 2022 funding for health record project, despite six-month pause

House appropriators are concerned that the Department of Veterans Affairs is seeking to fully fund its program to switch from its homegrown Vista system to Cerner's commercial electronic health record in 2022, despite having unspent funds from fiscal year 2021.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

DARPA's Pandemic Prevention Platform

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in early 2020, DARPA's 10 years of funding research and development on DNA and RNA vaccines, including a $25 million award to Moderna to help establish its messenger RNA platform, proved critical.

  • By Troy K. Schneider

Why VA must keep Vista healthy

The moratorium on further Vista investment put in place three years ago creates major strategic issues for the Department of Veterans Affairs as the agency looks to put Cerner's commercial electronic health record system in place.

  • By Roger Baker

How VA can succeed with its EHR mega-program

The former CIO of the Department of Veterans Affairs offers some ideas for course correction in the agency's flagging $20 billion–plus Electronic Health Records Modernization program.

  • By Roger Baker

Why VA's electronic health record mega-project is failing

The agency's former top technology official explains how management problems, reliance on outmoded development methodology and lack of customer buy-in are combining to sink (for now) a critical modernization project at the Department of Veterans Affairs.

  • By Roger Baker

Lawmakers balk at cost-overruns, transparency issues with VA's $21 billion health record program

At a Senate hearing last week, Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough noted deficiencies in training including the lack of a real system available for use by clinicians in advance of the go-live date for a new, integrated health care software system.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

DOD's electronic health records rollout hits 30% completion

The Defense Department's electronic health records system rollout nearly a third complete with 42,000 active users across more than a dozen states.

  • By Lauren C. Williams

VA chief looks at spend, productivity on $16B health record modernization plan

Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough told House lawmakers on Thursday that performance and joint execution were issues driving the 12-week "strategic review" of the Electronic Health Record Modernization program.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

VA plans 'strategic review' of $16B software program

New Veterans Affairs chief Denis McDonough announced a "strategic review" of the agency's Electronic Health Record Modernization program of up to 12 weeks.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

How to improve health IT

The past year has called unprecedented attention to public health systems and their underlying data, but federal agencies' struggles with health IT long predate the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • By Troy K. Schneider

DOD, Coast Guard resume MHS Genesis deployment

After a pause because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Defense Department's commercial health record installation program is back online. The Coast Guard is also transitioning to the new system.

  • By Lauren C. Williams
Featured eBooks

Ethics vs. compliance in AI

Tech experts warn against treating ethics as like just another box on a compliance checklist.

  • By Lauren C. Williams

FEHRM releases interoperability strategy

The strategy from the Federal Electronic Health Record Modernization program office offers a set of goals that are more about health outcomes and empowering patients that specific technological benchmarks.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

USAGov hones data, services

GSA's COVID-19 data aggregation operation sharpens information and services as pandemic continues.

  • By Mark Rockwell

VA on the fence about homegrown patient portal

The My HealtheVet tool used by more than 3 million veterans to access care at the Department of Veterans Affairs could be retired in favor of a tool from vendor Cerner as part of the agency's $16 billion electronic health record software upgrade.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

VA reboots health record rollout

Leaders of the VA's $16 billion health record modernization plan look to jumpstart their implementation schedule.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

HHS CIO resigns

Jose Arrieta will depart as the top tech official at the Department of Health and Human Services in the coming weeks.

  • By Adam Mazmanian

What our COVID response says about public management

Testing is all well and good, Steve Kelman notes, but true follow-through is the hard part.

  • By Steve Kelman