Army abruptly stops rollout of electronic dental record application

The Army Medical Command abruptly stopped fielding an electronic dental record application that is part of a larger health record network the Defense Department operates for soldiers, according to internal e-mails provided to Nextgov.

Maj. Gen. David Rubenstein, the Army's deputy surgeon general, directed what he called a "strategic pause" in the deployment of AHLTA Dental, which was supposed to start this week, according to the e-mails. AHLTA is the electronic health record system operated by Defense for members of the uniformed services.

The Defense Health Information Management System, which provides information technology systems to all three services, said the Army had planned to start deploying AHLTA Dental to 18 clinics this week in a briefing posted on the Health Information Management System's Web site.

The internal e-mails did not detail why the Army had stopped deploying AHLTA Dental, but a consultant who works closely with the Military Health System said the service may have decided to use its own electronic dental record, called the Corporate Dental Application, instead of AHLTA Dental, which both the Air Force and the Navy have embraced.

The Military Health System views the AHLTA electronic health record and its dental application as the only system to integrate all dental and health information in an individual database, called the MHS Clinical Data Repository, which maintains records on more than 9 million active-duty and retired military personnel and their families. MHS originally had planned to deploy AHLTA Dental to more than 370 Army, Air Force and Navy dental clinics worldwide.

Writing in the MHS Blog in March, Col. David Gilbertson, program manager for AHLTA, said AHLTA Dental will provide "dentists and their staff graphical charting tools for use during the exam to record the patient's pre-existing oral conditions, any current disease, and the patient's treatment needs. Everything from documenting teeth cleanings to performing comprehensive periodontal, endodontic and prosthodontic evaluation and treatment charting is supported by the application."

Gilbertson said he viewed computer charting of a patient's teeth as the "big leap forward" for AHLTA Dental and pointed out that the Army's Corporate Dental Application still used paper charts.

SAIC developed AHLTA Dental, and in June, the Army awarded an $11.6 million contract to maintain and enhance the Corporate Dental Application.

A spokeswoman for the Army Medical Command did not respond to questions before this article was posted.