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Success with VistA from the WorldVistA conference (LinuxMedNews)
LinuxMedNews reports on the
success of VistA. "This is a report on an excellent talk that I am
hearing on the factors of success with VistA. The subject is the seven
critical success with Medical Software. Essentially these are the lessons
that VistA has learned via hard knocks. This list is partly compiled from
those who have succeeded but mostly is the result of those who have failed
with VistA."
(Log in to post comments)
Incomprehensible article Posted Jun 30, 2006 21:34 UTC (Fri) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link] LWN's intro is ambiguous. Is this the next MS operating system, or something else?
Usually I ignore ambiguous teasers, since they're often a warning that the article subject is low quality and needs jazzing up, but I clicked on the article link this time and found that I still can't tell what they're talking about, even after reading the malnourished article.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jun 30, 2006 23:17 UTC (Fri) by dmarti (subscriber, #11625) [Link] Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture?
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 1, 2006 1:35 UTC (Sat) by JoeF (subscriber, #4486) [Link] Hmm, confusion galore: They also have a different meaning for DHCP: Decentralized Hospital Computer Program
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 1, 2006 2:02 UTC (Sat) by alonzo (guest, #2770) [Link] Incredable that the VA is still using MUMPS. I looked into the VA software and MUMPS somewhere around 1984 and found it virtually impossible to follow what was going on in their code. MUMPS is a cool language but, it allows you to write MUMPS code that writes MUMPS code on the fly (which, may then write more MUMPS code on the fly), making it nearly impossible to understand what a block of code is *really* doing without knowing what the data is at the same time.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 3, 2006 7:32 UTC (Mon) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link] Have you ever *programmed* in LISP? I gather that does the same thing. I'm sure you've *used* LISP :-)
Maybe a *half* of all BIOSs are written in another strange language - FORTH.
There are reasons certain languages are popular. Some are beloved by academics (Pascal), some are pushed by theoreticians (SQL), some just get to be popular (C), and others, like MUMPS and Pick (btw, MUMPS is now called Cache, I'm sure you've heard of it ...) are just old workhorses that get the job done.
You may find MUMPS very archaic. But I'd bet easy money that a MUMPS programmer could write a working database system far faster than somebody using the latest relational system, and it would run quicker too, and be more reliable. Sometimes, the old stuff really is the best ... :-)
Cheers,
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 3, 2006 10:18 UTC (Mon) by arcticwolf (guest, #8341) [Link]
Can you justify that claim in *any* way, or are you just repeating the "back in my day..." myth?
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 5, 2006 8:11 UTC (Wed) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link] I've never actually used Mumps. But I work with Pick technology.
There was a competition run some years back. Contestants turned up, were given a spec, and 24 hours to implement it. It was won by a Pick variant EVERY time. Often the Pick system was the only one that was actually completed in the deadline.
I've seen several recent stories about Pick being replaced by SQL - and the new system, on new hardware, ran slower and required more staff to look after it.
One of the current "leading lights" in the U2 (a Pick variant) scene at the moment is a manager who "just couldn't understand why her U2 programmers were far more productive than the SQL guys" and got converted to an evangelist as a result.
At the end of the day, relational theory is just that - a *mathematical* theory. Note my stress on the word MATHEMATICAL. There is no EVIDENCE (as in scientific proof) that it actually works in the real world. Relational theory is as proven as Euclidean geometry - ie it has mathematical proofs that it is clean and self-consistent. Unfortunately, Euclidean geometry also has scientific proof - proof that it is WRONG as far as the real world goes. I think the same is true of relational theory - the scientific proof says it is wrong.
(Please note - Euclid said parallel lines never meet - that is now the defining characteristic of Euclidean geometry - a small subset of the field of Geometry. Codd & Date said data comes in rows and columns - that is the defining characteristic of relational database theory. The problem with academia at present is that they think "relational database theory" equals "all of database theory". Like we now recognise that Euclidean geometry is a small subset of the whole, so should relational theory be a small subset of database theory. It took two thousand years to disabuse geometricians that "euclidean geometry" was not equal to "all of geometry". I hope it doesn't take that long for the same realisation to sink in about relational database theory.
Cheers,
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 1, 2006 3:00 UTC (Sat) by horen (subscriber, #2514) [Link] Yes, that is correct.
I'm a Vietnam veteran (and an 18-year Unix sysadmin), and I receive my medical care at the VA Medical Center in Riviera Beach, FL (just north of West Palm Beach). It's a ten-year-old facility, completely computerized, and during the past two years since I began going there, all my information has been available to medical staff in various non-adjacent clinics, and never once has anything gone missing or a mistake made because of missing information.
The very fact that VISTA is public-domain software speaks volumes about the direction in which key players in public service are moving for their organization's software needs.
Additionally, there is lots of FOSS for Linux and other Unix-variants, which can easily replace cumbersome and expensive-to-support commercial packages (not to mention that there just isn't software for certain office practice requirements, as well as the fact that many practices have yet to computerize patient records, billing, etc.)
I might have been Army, rather than Marine Corps, but I know the meaning of "Semper Fi", and VISTA helps the VA Medical Centers do just that for us vets (including those who've already begun returning from Iraq).
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 3, 2006 14:34 UTC (Mon) by kpower (subscriber, #37136) [Link] The source is LinuxMedNews. The abstract specifically mentions Medical software. The program/software is spelled, and referred to, as VistA, not MS Windows Vista TM
While the blurb could be disabiguated more, the reader could also apply reading comprehension and perception.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 3, 2006 17:42 UTC (Mon) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link] Any OS can be used in the medical sector, and people rarely mark Vista as clearly as you claim.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 4, 2006 12:11 UTC (Tue) by Tjebbe (subscriber, #34055) [Link] Besides, many of us have never ever heard of VistA (the non-microsoft one), so a little line about what it is or stands for would be very nice.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 4, 2006 22:12 UTC (Tue) by kpower (subscriber, #37136) [Link] People don't use beta-quality, non-released (for general use) operating systems in the medical sector.
Incomprehensible article Posted Jul 6, 2006 16:37 UTC (Thu) by kpower (subscriber, #37136) [Link] Sorry, coriordan. No need to harass you (or others). What seemed obvious to me, was not to you or others. Apologies for being such a bore with this.
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