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British Health System Looks at Linux
DanBrusca writes "The Observer is reporting that Britain's biggest employer, the National Health Service, may ditch Microsoft due to mounting licence costs. 'Richard Granger, NHS IT director, has ordered a trial of a Linux-based system from Sun Microsystems as part of a UKP2.3 billion computer modernisation plan. The plan could see Java Desktop software rolled out across the NHS's 1 million staff and 800,000 computers to replace Microsoft's Windows operating system and Office suite of programmes.'"
Linux is an 'open-source' system for running computers invented by a young Finnish student in 1991 and refined by thousands of programmers working together across the internet.
how long until they stop seeing it necessary to give linux a definition? i kinda wonder why they feel like 'quoting' open-source in this too, do they think they're lying? =D
My other sig is an import.
They will be un-assimilated
Charles Andrews, Sun Microsystem's public sector head, said licence cost savings would come to tens of millions of pounds directly. 'And we won't force people to upgrade computers and technology on a 2-3 year cycle either. Customers can upgrade when they need to,' he said.
Not a troll, but Linux is immune from upgrades? This is not the way to convince people to use Linux, by implying that once you install/download Linux, you can walk away without any more upgrades. I wish he had been more clear about the costs involved instead of being so vague.
is it that bad seein a hot chick again? if i see a hot chick walkin down the hall i dont say "repost"
The National Health Service, Britain's biggest employer, is considering ditching Microsoft software after a row over mounting licensing costs.
What's the chance that MS will be offering them a heavily discounted plan after this.
I might be a little cynical but could it just be the NHS trying to get a better deal from MS?
since when do end users get a say in their operating system? the doctors have the exact same amount of choice with the linux system that they had with the windows system: zero.
2 1337 4 u!
Maybe it's because that corporation provides services like an on-site support contract?
The owls are not what they seem
And you know what? It looks as though it's working. Getting their desktop act together combined with StarOffice and excellent support may help Sun out of it's doldrums after all.
I have to admit that I wasn't sold on the 'Java' desktop (whatever), but it seems that they are pushing the right buttons here.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Right, unlike our capitalist system of HMOs, and we all know that HMOs are about Choice, Choice, and more Choice, not to mention great service and care for clients. Thank god for Freedom!
The Free desktop that Just Works
Actually, it's hard to see but many US hospitals are slowly moving away from M$. This is done in many cases because of IBM who come in and sell Linux for its openness and auditability; which is in demand in the wake of the HIPAA regulations.
I agree about the universities, Microsoft is doing the RIAA thing and trying to buy their way into the classrooms for a propaganda war. Sad really that this goes under the radar to most people.
SCO: 800-726-8649
Verisign: 800-361-8319, 888-642-9675
Diebold: 800-433-VOTE (8683)
Linux Desktop System would be more accurate. Don't you think ? Don't forget . Sun is payrolling SCO by paying that IP license and has always distrusted linux. Ripping the nametag Linux off the OS software and replacing it with a Java title is something a greedy company would do.
You are 100% correct. However the life and death machines have never run Windows or Linux, and almost certainly never will. They are very strictly the domain of Real Time Operating Systems and embedded systems. (QNX comes to mind, but I'm not 100% sure if it's ever been used in medical equipment).
The rollout will be for generic office type machines, noting lab results, appointments, taking notes, rosters, and that hundred and one other, non-life-and-death uses.
Of the doctors in my hospital who know what an OS is, Linux gets a mention more often than not as a preferred platform.
Most people here run basic MS Office apps (and usually run them basically) and connect to legacy databases using terminals. Some people make their own Access databases but the IT people really hate that - you know how it goes: individual makes DB in Access, time passes, undocumented and poorly implemented Access database becomes the lynchpin of a Ward, originator leave, everyone's up shit creek.
We are migrating from '95 to XP and everyone is getting lots of training. This training could just as easily have been applied to Linus apps.
When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
You do realize that Britain's health system is socialist don't you? Under socialism, you take what is given to you.
Oh My God. A health system where you will be treated regardless, where you can get a heart bypass, a kidney transplant, cancer therapy or IVF treatment without someone first asking for your health insurance details or your credit card number and you choose to dismiss it because it's egalitarian?
I'm sorry, but I think a government has a few basic responsibilities towards its citizens. Making sure that it does its best to keep them all in good health by providing them all with decent medical care regardless of their ability to pay or their social standing is a good thing.
A sick child that needs a vital operation is a sick child that needs a vital operation. Whether or not her parents can afford to pay for whatever it takes to make her well again should not factor into the equation.
If this is what you decry as "socialist" then give me a "socialist" society any day of the week.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
That's the case at a lot of universities... want to know why? They want to hook you while you're young. They want you to get used to using Windows, so you won't want to break away from it and try something else.
It's also why Lexis-Nexus does so well. Lexis-Nexus is basically a case law database. It's almost always available for free by law students in the computer labs they have. Once they graduate and get out in the 'real world', they are used to the ease and familiarity of it that they keep using it, at whatever the going rate is (It's measured in dollars per minute).
It's OS and software crack.
Kierthos
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Actually it's not Windows that I am locked into at work, it's Office.
I have yet to find a way to get past Exchange and Citrix effectively. We looked at a few solutions that cames close, but the administration costs FAR outweighed the licensing savings (although Citrix licenses are astronomical). The other problem is that our document management system (necessary by law due to Sarbanes-Oxley Act) is iManage which only works with office and costs $75K.
[RIAA] says its concern is artists. That's true, in just the sense that a cattle rancher is concerned about its cattle.
This is great. Linux has gone from a university project in a country which has never had an empire to moving in on the largest software company in the world, all within a little over ten years. This is awesome achievement. Here on /. we spend a lot of time griping about not being able to cut and paste between KDE and Gnome apps, and complaining about the fact that the latest wireless card doesn't have a driver in Debian Unstable, etc, but let's take a moment to think about how awesome this is, thank those who made it happen (Linus and a cast of millions) and also think about what we are doing as part of it. Writing a new device driver? Helping a friend set it up? Or posting as AC on /.? Whatever it is, we have to give back to it somehow.
Wrong.
Some medical companies, names upon request, use Windows NT as the OS that runs their diagnostic and monitoring devices.
Many come with a warning to restart the device daily.
No joke.
- oZ
// i am here.
My parents are both currently working in the NHS, my Dad's a consultant at the local hospital, whereas my Mum's a GP.
The way that they use computers (mainly for work) is fairly simple. My Dad will use some form of presentation building software - for preparing talks at meetings, a web browser - for filling in his "education" points list, and a word processor - for writing letters. That's it - for work both at home and at the hospital where he works. I've found that once the computer has Linux installed on it, he's got no real problems (using GNOME as a Window Manager) doing this tasks. He likes StarOffice Impress, and he's commented that Galeon is faster than Internet Explorer.
My Mum, is generally the same, she needs a scanner - for preparing practice booklets, or information leaflets, a word processor, an email client, and that's about it. At work, she says, I just "put in my password, click OK, and then click on the program icon". Now, that's not something that'd be hard to implement on Linux. Also, being part of a General Practice, they have to purchase their own computers, and software. She has commented before on the cost of the software, and how it seems to be "paying a lot for not very much".
My thoughts? Can Linux be implemented as a desktop implementation for users? Definitely. The user does not need to install software, or hardware for that matter - they cannot at the moment, as they're not "administrators" on their own machines.
Remote management would be easier, IMHO, and there'd be less problems with network floods due to virii that inevitably end up on the Windows systems.
The Police in our area, West Yorkshire, UK, have already made the switch and are running their systems on Linux. This, to me, is an indicator of how Linux, when properly implemented, can be used on the desktop. If the NHS do come up with a decent solution, I'd imagine they'll see the benefits (probably mainly cost benefits).
This post is based purely on personal experience
hopefully moving to Linux will help combat the problems various NHS trusts had with recent computer virus attacks - I know of one Trust where for weeks access to online medical records was only possible for a short amount of time every day.. makes one wonder how big the human cost of computer viruses is..
Please note that the parent post is exagerating - it does not take 6 months to see an NHS doctor, it takes anything from 1 - 7 days depending on where you go.
Secondly, this project was the idea of the NHS, not the government, and the NHS IT director is negotiating with the government for the funding. See this Register story.
Steve.
A latent existence
when it takes 6 months to see a doctor for a sore throat
What the fuck are you smoking? I can nip down to my doctor and see her this afternoon (spend 10 minutes in the waiting room) and get a prescription there and then... nip out of the door and round to the chemist to pick it up.
A couple of years ago, my Dad was given a blood test which showed up possible cancer. In one week he saw a specialist and was sent for further tests (again within a week) which revealed early prostate cancer. Within a month he was in hospital having his prostate removed by the best specialty surgeon and team in the country followed by chemotherapy.
Cost to him: 0. God bless the NHS, and fuck right-wing loonies who think the U.S and its third-world civilisation approach to healthcare works.
My personal experience of the NHS (which I and my partner have used extensively in the last few years) is that it is improving rapidly - waiting times reducing, lots of new buildings, being called for appointments on time... The media always latch onto the worst cases, so as a result those who haven't used the NHS recently think it is much worse than it actually is. It is in the national interest to have healthcare available to all regardless of means in the same way it was in the national interest years ago to provide a proper sewage system instead of having it rotting in the street. It's all very well to say that each individual should be responsible for their own healthcare but that's not much consolation to those who *have* paid when they are (for example) killed by an epidemic which starts among the 'uncovered' population. Or take the example of a low paid worker with no health cover who currently makes a small contribution to GDP and taxation. A leg injury which needs an operation they can't afford permanantly removes them from the labour market, even though it is actually cheaper for the rest of the population to pay for the operation and get them back to work and contributing...