Fred Trotter reports that he has been able to set up a meeting with the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology presumably to discuss the use of free software in healthcare.

The best established certification body is CCHIT. They have not been named as the certification body, but they are likely lobbying for that role. However, CCHIT has had an anti-open source stance for years. For years, I and other activists in the community have chosen
to largely ignore this bias. Simply because CCHIT was an optional certification. Now, things have changed. It is possible that the government will mandate a certification program that is either CCHIT or similarly unfriendly to FOSS.

Recently I submitted my complaints to Dennis Wilson (associated with both FOSS Laika and employed by CCHIT) who put me in touch with Mark Leavitt. As a main result of that discussion, Mark has agreed to have a meeting with the community-at-large about this issue at HIMSS (please see the forwarded message from the CCHIT e-newsletter below).

Granted, this is like offering to meet with the Rebel Alliance at the annual Death Star conference. HIMSS is decidedly anti-open source. HIMSS EHR Vendor association continues to limit membership to vendors who “design, develop and market its own proprietary Electronic Health Record (EHR) software application.” Further HIMSS has specially advocated against the US governmenfunding FOSS EHR solutions, which implicitly includes VA development of VistA. There is also great concern about the ties between CCHIT and HIMSS/EHRVA. Leavitt himself was employed by HIMSS immediately before his current position and is currently a fellow of HIMSS. CCHIT maintains that the two organizations are independant, everyone else seems to understand the dangerous familiarity between the two organizations.

I’m hoping that this will lead to a change of heart in the organization. Governments are willing to trust free software. Why not healthcare?

• Fred Trotter
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