Andrew Ho [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > On Tue, 26 Oct 2004, Joseph Dal Molin wrote: > > > While the UK has not gone with open source solutions for its health > > systems it would be great if they simply adopted open, > collaborative > > knowledge/experience sharing to support their current EHR > deployment > > efforts. > > Joseph, > I am sure NHS can get that too if they are willing to pay > for it (in terms of money and other resources/risks). This > includes willingness to subject themselves to peer-review. > Perhaps this is one of the factors that prevented them from > adopting the open source approach in the first place? By > selecting the closed-source approach, a big part of their > methodology will be inaccessible to the public for review.
The intrinsically secretive nature of the Westminister/Whitehall system of government is often a surprise to those hailing from more open regimes. On the other hand, those familiar with the Westminister/Whitehall system tend to be constantly surprised at the level of political influence which is present in the judicial and adminsitrative arms of government in the US. Watching a TV programme last night on the coming election battle in the US, and in Florida in particular, I was flabberghasted to learn that the same Republican-appointed electoral commisioner who designed the ambiguous "butterfly" voting punch cards for Palm Beach County, Florida - the ones which enabled George Bush to gain office - is still in her job, and has now selected a closed-source electronic voting system without a paper trail (the Sequioa system, I think - see http://www.sequoiavote.com/testimonials.php). Which is queue to give a plug to open source e-voting initiatives, such as http://www.openvotingconsortium.org and http://evm2003.sourceforge.net These projects are of interest because the security and privacy issues relating closely to those of collecting confiential data from patients eg surveys or epidemiological studies. Tim C
