On Sat, 4 Jan 2003, Ignacio Valdes wrote: ... > I work at 5 different ones every month. Knowing a new interface for > each is ridiculous.
Going back to John Gage's original proposal, what if you can access information from 5 different hospitals through the same "e-mail client" interface? At the same time, other physicians can use their own client software, not necessarily the same one you prefer. Your ability to use the same interface across systems does not imply a homogenous backend. Dave's vision of heterogenous-but-interoperable systems includes support for multiple clients/interfaces. VistA may be quite good or even the best solution in many ways - but it is by no means perfect. R+D will still to need to continue. I see GnuMed, OIO, OpenEMed, etc as R+D efforts to take us beyond VistA. Maybe if we devote more energy to marketing VistA, it will accelerate dissemination of VistA (if you believe lack of marketing is the bottleneck). However, some of us are not so good or interested in marketing - so we contribute what we can through the various R+D efforts. Personally, I would be quite pleased if some of what we have been working on through the OIO project will eventually be implemented for VistA. :-) Best regards, Andrew --- Andrew P. Ho, M.D. OIO: Open Infrastructure for Outcomes www.TxOutcome.Org (Hosting OIO Library #1 and OSHCA Mirror #1)
