The Department of Veterans Affairs deployed the new Federal Electronic Health Record system to four sites in Ohio and Kentucky on Saturday, bringing the total number of VA health systems using the software to 14.
Saturday’s rollout marks the second deployment this year to additional VA medical centers following a years-long pause prompted by implementation issues and safety concerns.
The FEHR, made by Cerner, was rolled out to four VA health care facilities and their associated clinics in Michigan in April, the first VA-specific facilities to receive it since 2022.
On Saturday, the VA activated the system at the Cincinnati VA Medical Center, Chillicothe VA Medical Center and Dayton VA Medical Center in Ohio, as well as the Cincinnati VA Medical Center-Fort Thomas in Kentucky.
According to the VA, more than 7,200 VA providers and staff members and 107,000 veterans will have access to the new system in southern Ohio.
VA Secretary Doug Collins told members of Congress in April that the resumption of the program, which was put on hold to address system issues, is going as planned.
“How I know this is working … is that I’m having center executive directors and employees at what is supposed to be next year’s facilities hearing [about it] from their colleagues, and they’re saying ‘We’re ready to go now. We’ve been training; we’ve been doing this — we’re ready to speed up our training,’” Collins told members of the Senate Military Construction, Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee.
The VA’s adoption of Oracle Health’s EHR was halted in 2023 following a year-long pause over safety and functionality concerns. The program was introduced to medical centers in Washington, Oregon and Ohio between 2020 and 2022 but experienced reliability and safety issues and cost increases.
VA officials said Monday the Michigan rollout — the first following the pause other than a 2024 “go-live” at the joint Department of Defense-Veterans Affairs James Lovell Federal Health Care Center in North Chicago — introduced more than 200,000 veterans and 10,000 staff members to the system.
It has received “exceptionally positive” feedback from users and hospital administrators, they said in a press release.
To achieve a smooth rollout, the VA hired additional staff, fixed “hundreds of problems” related to the initial rollout in the Pacific Northwest and streamlined the administration overseeing the implementation, according to Deputy Secretary Paul Lawrence.
The VA’s fiscal 2027 budget request calls for $4.2 billion to continue deploying the system across 170 VA medical centers.
The department plans to introduce the system to three medical centers in Indiana in August and facilities in Alaska and Cleveland, Ohio, in October.
Patricia Kime is a senior writer covering military and veterans health care, medicine and personnel issues.
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