Three Democratic senators are calling on the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to push for stronger accountability provisions in its ongoing contract negotiations with Oracle Cerner on the Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program.
In a May 6 letter released publicly on Friday, Sens. Jon Tester, D-Mont., Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, called on the VA “to use the opportunity the new contract structure provides to re-review terms and add additional accountability and oversight provisions to protect veterans and taxpayers.”
The VA’s current EHRM contract is set to expire on May 16. The agency successfully renegotiated a tougher EHRM contract last year to hold Oracle Cerner accountable for technical fixes to the program whose rollout has been beset with difficulties.
The renegotiation updated the contract from a five-year term to five one-year terms – that way the agency can renegotiate each year if need be.
It also included larger fines or “monetary credits” that Oracle Cerner would need to pay if it does not meet expectations, increasing the VA’s ability to hold the contractor accountable.
While the senators – who are all members of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee – acknowledged that there have been some improvements to the EHR system over the last year, they said “significant challenges remain.”
“For example, in February of this year Oracle Health’s delivery of the so-called ‘Block 10’ software release was incomplete due to the need to pull back and fix several pharmacy-focused upgrades that had code errors. As you know, pharmacy software upgrades are among the most important changes requested by VA frontline medical staff,” they said.
“After its purchase of Cerner, Oracle Health committed to putting significant additional IT engineers and other relevant personnel and financial resources on this project to get it back on track,” they added. “After years of veterans not receiving the care they deserve and VA staff not getting the system they need, the department must take all steps possible to ensure VA is getting the services it purchased at a fair price and that Oracle Health is living up to its commitments.”
Once the agency’s contract negotiations conclude this week, the senators asked the VA to provide them with “a summary of the new enforcement provisions and terms.” Additionally, they want a summary of how the VA used last year’s contract agreement to achieve better outcomes.
The EHRM program is currently in the middle of a reset period, putting all future deployments on pause while the agency and Oracle Cerner make technical improvements to the system.
VA Secretary Denis McDonough told lawmakers last month that the agency does not plan on being in reset mode for the entirety of fiscal year 2025.
“We’re not staying in reset forever. We’re going to get into deployment,” McDonough said. “During the course of this year, as we approach the end of the year, I anticipate us being in discussions to get out of reset.”
