The health care sector is set for a technology-driven transformation as the federal government pushes adoption of electronic health records and pursues national health information exchange. Hardly surprising, the Open Source Convention (OSCON) has a health care track. But will health care IT consultants embrace open source? Here's an overview.

Today's Report of the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission, "A Healthier Future For All Australians: Final Report," makes the e-health system a central plank in the future of health management in Australia.

Lakin Hospital, a long-term nursing facility operated by the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources, has adopted an open source electronic health record.

Or at least it will be if Open Health Tools, a new project to create standards and interoperable systems for accessing electronic health records, is a success.

Sun Microsystems' open-source software is one of the key components of the NHIN-Connect, the gateway that has enabled multiple federal agencies and private-public organizations to communicate across platforms

The basic program is called VistA; the name was chosen well before a Certain Other Company copied the move, and the code began life as an electronic health records system for U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

Using Web-based interfaces, mobile phones and PDAs, open source systems can provide far-reaching and innovative tools to support increased efficiency, productivity and performance of health services and information to meet the needs of families and communities across Africa.

"...IWEEE is not a pure technical conference. It will focus on the human factor and in raising awareness about the actual situation. We will discuss the tools that we can provide today to doctors and institutions to improve their habitants health and education.

Coverity famously helps open source projects audit their code and eliminate security holes and other bugs, and earns its corporate income by selling software that does the same thing to proprietary software companies. Few seem to realize, though, that Coverity started doing free open source code audits because it got a grant from the US Department of Homeland Security.