The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) recently announced the establishment of the Office of Electronic Health Record Modernization (OEHRM). The new department will be focused on ensuring a successful transition from the legacy patient data system, providing a better transition for Veterans moving from active duty status.

Learn more about the new department and how it will strive to provide Veterans with a higher quality of medical care.

The Office of Electronic Health Record Modernization to Improve Veteran Care

The office was launched in late June 2018 and will oversee the installation of the VA’s new electronic health-care record system and its associated health information technology tools. Led by Genevieve Morris, on special duty to the VA from her position as the principal deputy national coordinator for the Department of Health and Human Services and staffed with subject matter experts, OEHM will work closely with the VA’s Chief Information Officer and Under Secretary of Health.

“OEHRM, the Veterans Health Administration and the Office of Information and Technology will continue to collaborate closely to ensure this important transition is as smooth as possible for our Veterans, clinicians and staff,” Morris said. “We are working hard to configure and design a system focused on quality, safety and patient outcomes, which will allow health IT innovations within one VA facility to be used across the entire VA health-care system.”

OEHRM will work to replace the current decades-old system with the new system, which will allow the Department of Defense (DoD) and VA to share patient data with each other, helping ease the transition for active duty military members into veteran status.

“As the needs of our Veterans evolve, we must also evolve our systems to support better care for our Veterans,” said VA’s Acting Secretary Peter O’Rourke. “This office is dedicated entirely to our electronic health record modernization and will bring significant and diverse expertise to get VA to the end-state that will allow medical records to transition seamlessly for service members departing active duty into Veteran status.”

Written by Alissa Sauer