How Cerner Deal Could Change the EHR Market

What does the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) deal with Cerner Corporation mean for the broader electronic health record (EHR) market? While the immediate impact will be limited, according to most health information technology experts, the trickle-down effect from the massive contract could ultimately make the project a “win” for small practice physicians as well.
Bruce Kleaveland, president of Kleaveland Consulting, a health IT consulting firm in Bellevue, Washington, expects EHR interoperability to get a significant boost from the initial two-year, $4.3 billion deal to replace the military’s outdated EHR system. (The DoD estimates the project will take 10 years to complete, at a total cost of about $9 billion.)
Cerner, which partnered with Leidos and Accenture on the project, will need to migrate information not only through the DoD healthcare system but also to the Veterans Health Administration and TRICARE, a complex civilian health insurance program serving military personnel, military retirees and their families.
“It’s not just interoperability within a single vendor, but interoperability across multiple vendors,” Kleaveland says. “To the extent they are able to achieve that and set standards everyone can easily comply with, it’s a very positive thing.”
Mark Anderson, FHIMSS, chief executive officer for the healthcare technology advisory and research firm AC Group in Montgomery, Texas, does not expect the DoD contract to derail Cerner’s commitment or service to its private sector clients either, in part because Leidos and Accenture will be doing much of the actual work on the DoD contract.