Industry Alliance to Promote VA Electronic Health Record Technology

VistA Software Alliance to bring affordable EHR software to healthcare providers

Bethesda, MD — A new trade association has been formed to speed the adoption of electronic health records (EHR) in private sector healthcare organizations, by leveraging proven cost-effective EHR software currently serving more than 4 million patients nationwide.

Members of the new association, the VistA Software Alliance, will be leveraging VistA, a fully integrated, patient-centric healthcare management system originally developed by the Veterans Administration (VA) for use in its hospitals and clinics. The software has also been used in other federal agencies and by other healthcare systems in the U.S and throughout the world.

The fully featured VistA software is released free to the public, and thus compares favorably to commercial EHR systems on the market. The companies of the VSA plan to deploy VistA for use by hospitals, clinics, long-term care facilities, and public health departments outside of the federal government.

The success of VSA members in deploying VistA supports the federal initiative to promote widespread adoption of electronic health records.

The VA and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) plan to release a version of VistA tailored to medical practices in mid-2005. The new software, VistAOffice EHR, will be released to the public domain.

“In order to realize the benefits of EHRs, hospitals and medical practices need a system that is fully functional and affordable,” said Barbara Boykin, chairman of the VistA Software Alliance. “VistA offers a unique combination of affordability with proven electronic health record technology. VistA and VistAOffice EHR will allow more healthcare organizations to utilize electronic health records to improve quality, lower costs, and decrease patient errors.”

“The members of the VistA Software Alliance stand ready to support the efforts of CMS and the VA to speed EHR adoption throughout the U.S. Our members are uniquely positioned to provide professional support for VistA with public and private healthcare providers,” Boykin said.

About the VistA Software Alliance

The VistA Software Alliance is a membership organization organized under the Non-Profit Corporation Act of the District of Columbia and Section 501(c)(6) of the Internal Revenue Code.

The organization is initially governed by a nine-member board of directors, and a three-member executive committee. The founding directors represent Document Storage Systems, Inc., Hewlett-Packard Company, InterSystems Corporation, Medical Alliances, Inc., Medsphere Systems Corporation, Oleen Healthcare Information Management, Inc., Perot Systems Corporation and Sea Island Systems.

The VSA’s offices are located at 7315 Wisconsin Ave. Suite 400E, Bethesda, MD 20814. Its website is at http://www.VistASoftware.org, and additional information can be obtained from info@VistASoftware.org or at 800-466-4760 ext. 247.