DoD May Keep Its EMR Until 2018

Though it had previously announced plans to update its system by 2017, the Department of Defense is now looking for contractors who can support its current EMR, the Armed Forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application (AHLTA), through 2018, according to iHealthBeat.

The DoD and VA have been working for years to integrate their separate systems,but seemingly have little to show for their efforts. The two sprawling agencies kicked off their effort to create an integrated record, the iEHR, back in 2009. The idea was to offer every service member to maintain a single EMR throughout their career and lifetime, iHealthBeat reports. But the effort has been something of a disaster.

The iEHR project was halted in February 2013, with officials deciding to work on making their current EMR systems more interoperable. A few months later, DoD Secretary Chuck Hagel wrote a memo stating that the agency will consider a commercial EMR system. Most recently, the DoD asked 27 EMR vendors to provide demos of possible EMR replacements, according to iHealthBeat.

In DoD’s pre-solicitation notice, DoD announced that it would extend the contract for AHLTA’s underlying Composite Healthcare System, which is the back end of the military EMR.  The Composite Health System handles laboratory tests, prescriptions and scheduling.

That being said, the DoD is also moving along with its iEHR plans once again, a gigantic project which the Interagency Program Office estimates will cost somewhere between $8 billion and $12 billion. A contractor named Systems Made Simple recently won the contract to provide systems integration and engineering support for creating  the iEHR.

Folks, if you can follow the twists and turns of this story — they’ve giving me whiplash — you’re a better person than I am. So far as I can tell, the DoD changes its mind about once a quarter as to what it really wants and needs. Seems to me that Congress ought to keep that birch rod handy that it used on HHS over the HealthCare.gov debacle. Isn’t somebody going to get this thing once and for all on track?

About the author

Anne Zieger

Anne Zieger is a healthcare journalist who has written about the industry for 30 years. Her work has appeared in all of the leading healthcare industry publications, and she's served as editor in chief of several healthcare B2B sites.

   

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