I use this forum to grip quite a bit. When someone does something silly or stupid, I do not hesitate to blast them. It is only fitting that when someone does something right, they get equal time for praise.
Skip McGaughey and his new group the Open Health Tools seem to qualify. Here is what they have done right:
- They have some of the most important players already committed to the movement, including Eclipse, IBM, Red Hat and the VA.
- They are posting the minutes to their meetings on the web, demonstrating a commitment to openness.
- They already have a good FAQ which is complete enough to include some of their thoughts on licensing. Again, openness.
- They are posting detailed information about their initial project.
- Skip already has credibility in the community because of his participation within Eclipse community.
- The particpants in may cases are already releasing substantial health code-bases, so the group has lots of “doers”.
Its not often that I can recommend someone out of the gate, but so far it appears that the Open Health Tools group is firing on all cylinders. They only thing left to do is make new, relevant, and usable code that gets deployed in real clinical environments.
Modern Healthcare interpreted my reaction to the groups announcement as “skeptical“, which I would probably rephrase as “hopeful”. (The problem with generally being skeptical is that even your hope can come across as negative….)
But who cares what I have to say? Dana Blankenhorn already has an interview with Skip McGaughey up, and it is definitely worth a read!!
-FT