The following appeared recently.
Health shortlists infrastructure tenders
Fujitsu, CSC and at least two consortia of smaller e-health providers are believed to be among those shortlisted for potential participation in the Federal Government’s $467 million personally controlled electronic health record (PCEHR) initiative.
- James Hutchinson (Computerworld)
- 24 May, 2011 12:23
The national infrastructure partner, one of four such partners sought by the Department of Health and Ageing for the e-health rollout, would deliver, integrate and provide continued maintenance for enabling systems including core system infrastructure; operations and call centres; reporting and template servicing; and separated portals for use by both consumers and healthcare providers.
Computerworld Australia believes companies including Fujitsu, Oracle, Microsoft, CSC and Telstra were among those shortlisted for phase two of the tendering process.
It is also believed they were notified both by the department and by others shortlisted earlier in May, almost a month after the initial 12 April date communicated to tenderers. The delay could push back further steps in the roadmap, which aimed to have a final stage 2 panel notified by the end of May and contracts signed by 30 June for beginning of negotiations and implementation talks.
Integration would take place ahead of a build and test phase beginning April next year, ahead of the go live date on 1 July 2012.
A spokesperson for the department said the tendering process was ongoing but refused to verify which companies had been shortlisted.
More here:
One never ceases to be amazed at the unreality of the PCEHR Program. Now we find that today (plus or minus a day or two) the successfully shortlisted tenders to deliver the PCEHR Infrastructure are given a few weeks to finalise a proposal and have it back to DoHA. From there their needs to be an evaluation, contract negotiations, announcements and then mobilisation to deliver whatever is to be delivered.
From here you can be sure there will be no final announcement in under a couple of months unless the whole thing is undertaken with careless indifference to the public interest.
We only have to look to the UK to see how the providers of similar services can deliver a lot less than they promised and do it very late. To finalise a delivery contract of this scale in a few weeks is frankly a joke.
This report a day or so ago in the Financial Times in London makes the risk totally clear!
Health records contract ‘holds taxpayer to ransom’
By Nicholas Timmins and Sally Gainsbury
Published: May 23 2011 23:57 | Last updated: May 23 2011 23:57
The cost of cancelling the remainder of Computer Sciences Corporation’s £3bn worth of contracts to install an electronic patient record for some 30m NHS patients could prove higher than to let it run its course, parliament’s spending watchdog was told on Monday.
Christine Connelly, head of the NHS IT programme, said the “absolute maximum” to which the NHS “could be exposed” was more than is left to run on the consultancy’s deal. Figures from the National Audit Office suggest that amounts to £1.6bn.
“We could be exposed to a higher cost” than the cost “it would take to complete the programme today”, she told the Commons public accounts committee.
Lots more here:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/29cbd372-8580-11e0-ae32-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1NFIgBRMD
We are talking a good deal more than tea money here!
It also needs to be remembered that there is presently only a DRAFT concept of operations for the PCEHR, the applicable standards have not been finalised and there are no actual specification from which a build or procurement of sub components can commence.
The DRAFT Concept of Operations does not even conclude its public consultation period until May 31, 2011. Not long to produce a useful final document also then!
This whole program becomes more and more fantastic as every week goes by!
David.
