Open source software for developing world hospitals

That is indeed the case (medical record software not being classified as a medical device software product in Europe). However medical record software has been added to also be covered some ISO 80xxx standard. However in the USA medical record software is considered a class B or even class C medical product by the FDA, depending on if the software is used just for record keeping or actively used for therapy planning.

"At it's core the government need only do one thing to encourage innovation in the interoperability space and it is this:

The government, by means of regulation and incentive, ensure that any vendor of data systems that create or store data make adequate interoperability features and documentation available for said system.

I call this the Core Mandate. The core mandate must be unequivocal with no loopholes. What do I mean by "interoperability features"? Simply:

- If a system creates data, the ability to read that data is fully described in documentation.

- If a system stores data, the vendor will provide an API and/or SDK, with accompanying documentation, such that authenticated requests may create, read, update or delete that data programmatically as appropriate.

A system is defined as any software application or hardware device."

[0] http://siculars.posthaven.com/health-data-integration-regula...

The reality is that some of the biggest vendors (US and UK based) actually ship some of the worst software and charge hundreds of millions of pounds for it. Ultimately, its the patients that pay the price. It's a complete myth that bigger vendors build safer systems.

I agree with a previous poster in that given more visibility, I'm sure there are thousands of developers that would love to contribute to this type of project (myself included).

It's also pretty clear that mobile will be a key requirement for this type of solution. Not just a responsive website but full native implementations. I realise that this can be expensive, but if it's open source, I'm sure there are developers that would love to get involved. Maybe you would consider an API? This might encourage an ecosystem of client solutions to flourish.

Finally, do you think there is a role for a patient login here? There is a world-wide movement to encourage patients to play a more active role in managing their healthcare and giving patients mobile access to their health records is a great first step towards this.

Some such software is released open-source, e.g. NifTK, FSL, MedINRIA. Some is spun out and then sold through vendors as a service, e.g. Siemens, icoMetrix, many others.

Why aren't things used more? I'd say the main bottlenecks are monetary, political and cultural. Doctors are often set in their ways, and hospital management staff are risk-averse. Moreover, because of legal liability issues, a lot of this stuff has not been formally approved for clinical use -- so hospitals won't touch it. This is especially true of the open-source software. Getting approved is an expensive and time-consuming process. Service contracts with approved software are expensive, mostly as a result of this.

Heck, look at the struggle involved in digital patient records, which is supposedly a simpler problem than imaging. In the UK, we've spent billions on that without getting anything usable. There are uniquely bad political reasons for that, but it's illustrative nonetheless.