VistA - Free software written for the DVA (Score 2)

There's been some heated discussion about M[UMPS], and somebody lamented that the Department of Veteran's Affairs system, known as VistA, ought to be available for free. It is. See Hardhats.Org.

The VistA software is written in M[UMPS], and is available via the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

There are a couple of versions of MUMPS under Linux. I also know of one that works under FreeBSD (The M system under FreeBSD isn't free, but neither is Oracle, which has been mentioned as the database for a few systems mentioned in response to the query!)

VistA Strengths:
It's just about free.
It is used in hospitals worldwide. I know of implementations in Arabic, Finnish, and German.
There are modules for most of the major clinical functions.

VistA Problems:
Modules lacking: 1) billing (this is a real problem - see other posts on the complexity of rules and regulations generated by 50 states and dozens of insurers.) 2) pediatrics.
VistA does not have a centralized "Patient Record". This has caused me some pain, because I've written code to archive medical data from this system.
Some of the modules have really poor code. Lab is infamous.

Although VistA has been around for a long time, there are always new developments. There is work going on to create a Patient Record, and there is now a CORBA ORB available to extract data from the system and make it available to object based systems.

I'm biased; I've worked with the system off and on for years, and yes, I'm one of the HardHats. There are many of us; we promote and support the use of VistA worldwide./