Military Electronic Health Records System 'Intolerable'

Defense Department complains about own department's electronic health record (EHR) system.

By Sindya Bhanoo
Tue, March 31, 2009

The Industry Standard — Top Defense Department officials have blasted the department's electronic health record (EHR) system, saying it frequently crashes and sometimes generates duplicate records.

The system, called AHLTA, was developed for the military by Northrop Grumman. AHLTA was launched in 2006 to maintain the health records of more than 9 million Military Health System beneficiaries, including soldiers and sailors.

In a Joint Military Personnel and Terrorism, Unconventional Threats and Capabilities Subcommittees meeting last Tuesday, officials discussed the future of electronic health records in the military in a meeting titled, "AHLTA is 'Intolerable', Where Do We Go From Here?"

Rear Adm. Thomas Cullison, who serves as deputy Navy surgeon general, said the Navy was experiencing "reliability and performance issues" with AHLTA. The system crashes as much as once a week and the interface is clunky and awkward for doctors, Cullison said. Officials from the Army and Air Force had similar testimonies.

The military is still, however, committed to using electronic health records.

"I strongly believe that an effective and usable EHR will also contribute immeasurably to reducing the cost of Federal healthcare and sustaining a generous healthcare benefit for soldiers and their families," Lt. Gen. Eric Schoomaker, the Army's surgeon general said in his testimony.

Defense Department officials said they wanted a system similar to the Veteran Administration's electronic health record system, which has been praised for its ease of use. A new version of AHLTA, expected to be more like the VA's system, will be deployed later this year, Nextgov.com reported.

Nationwide, President Barack Obama has pledged that he will digitize all medical records in the United States by 2014. To date, only about 9% of hospitals nationwide have converted to electronic medical records, according to a recent study by the New England Journal of Medicine.

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