The Democratic chair of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee signaled his support for VA to continue moving forward with its multi-billion dollar electronic health record modernization program, even as leading House Republicans have introduced legislation that would terminate the new system’s rollout unless significant changes are made to improve its deployment.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., indicated that technical and performance issues with the Oracle Cerner EHR system’s rollout do not undercut the fact that VA’s legacy health information system—known as the Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture, or VistA—needs to be updated…

Tester’s comments came after Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont.—chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee on Technology Modernization—introduced legislation on Jan. 27 that “would end the Oracle Cerner electronic health record program at VA if it cannot demonstrate significant improvement but is nonetheless introduced to additional medical centers.” The bill would also revert all of the medical facilities currently using the EHR system back to VistA. Rosendale’s bill was co-sponsored by Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., the chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee… Read the full article here.