Senate Veterans’ Affairs and Appropriations Committee Leaders Spearhead Effort to Restructure, Enhance, and Improve New EHR Program and Increase Oversight
WASHINGTON, D.C. – March 30, 2023 – Today, U.S. Senators Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Jon Tester (D-MT) and Patty Murray (D-WA) are spearheading a legislative push to deliver a complete overhaul of the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program.
The Senators will introduce comprehensive legislation in the coming days that would require VA to implement a series of EHRM reforms to better serve veterans, medical personnel, and taxpayers. Their bill would restructure, enhance, and strengthen the entire EHRM program. It would also mandate aggressive reporting to Congress to increase oversight, accountability, and transparency following a series of challenges with the system and program, including those found in VA’s recent EHRM Sprint Report and review from the Government Accountability Office. This is the latest in a series of challenges related to the program which launched in 2017 and was deployed at the first VA hospital in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Too many veterans and workers have faced confusion and unnecessary problems because of VA’s Electronic Health Record rollout. VA needs a reset, and must meet specific metrics on patient safety, cost, and VA employee productivity, to improve morale and improve veterans’ experiences when they turn to the VA for care,” said Senator Brown. “As VA employees at Chalmers in Columbus continue to work through issues related to Oracle Cerner’s product, I’ll continue fighting for them, and for the veterans they serve, to improve this program before the Department moves forward with any other VA facilities.”
Among its many provisions, the Senators’ legislation would require VA to:
- Develop clear metrics to guide whether and how VA should go forward with the new EHR at additional VA facilities and require additional resources to support those facilities;
- Require VA and Oracle Cerner to fix the technology features connected to the health safety and delivery issues found in VA’s March 2023 Sprint Report;
- Not move forward with the new EHR at other VA health facilities until the data at the five facilities that currently use the new EHR demonstrates an ability to deliver health care to veterans at standards that surpass metrics using VA’s VistA system or that meet national health operations standards as determined by the Under Secretary for Health;
- Appoint a lead senior negotiator and leverage other federal agencies and independent outside experts to offer advice and strategies for managing aggressive EHR contract negotiations with Oracle Cerner to protect taxpayers and veterans;
- Develop an alternative “Plan B” strategy for a new EHR in the event Oracle Cerner will not agree to new contract terms that protect taxpayers and increase accountability and penalties for poor performance or for when VA data shows it cannot get the technology to work to serve veterans efficiently and safely;
- Reform major acquisitions at VA to prevent future programs with poor contracting, oversight, management, and planning from occurring; and
- Require an existing VA Advisory Committee to add health care experts with proven experience implementing EHR deployments to advise VA leaders on potential strategies on how to improve VA EHRM’s implementation based on prior lessons learned in the private and non-profit health sectors.
The legislation would also require the Department of Defense (DoD) to report to Congress quarterly on steps it is taking fix DoD information technology systems, including those that are outdated and are negatively impacting VA’s ability to deliver health care, benefits, and other services, including through the new EHR.
Earlier this month, Brown pressed VA and Oracle Cerner officials about patient safety, interoperability, and readiness concerns regarding VA’s Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) rollout.
In October, Brown and U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Deputy Secretary Donald M. Remy toured the Chalmers P. Wylie VA Ambulatory Care Center in Columbus. During the visit, Brown and Remy met with facility leadership and frontline staff and discussed VA’s electronic health record modernization and the facility’s priorities. The Chalmers facility started using Oracle Cerner’s Electronic Health Record in April, but ongoing technical issues have created challenges for frontline staff during the transition.
In July, Brown spoke with VA officials at a Senate Veterans’ Affairs hearing about patient safety, interoperability, and readiness concerns regarding VA’s EHR roll out.