The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced on Friday that it plans to resume the rollout of its Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program in mid-2026 by deploying the Federal EHR system to four Michigan facilities: Ann Arbor, Battle Creek, Detroit, and Saginaw.
VA said it is beginning early-stage planning for these deployments after spending over a year and a half in “reset” mode. As part of the EHRM program reset, the VA and contractor Oracle Cerner focused on improvements at the six sites where the EHR system is currently deployed.
“We paused deployments of the EHR for more than a year and a half to listen to veterans and clinicians, understand the issues, and make improvements to the system,” said VA Deputy Secretary Tanya Bradsher. “As a result of those efforts, veteran trust and system performance have improved across the board. Now, we’re ready to begin planning for new deployments in 2026 – while continuing to improve at all existing sites.”
According to the VA, the new EHR system has experienced a significant decrease in outages. Since January 2024, the VA said the system was functioning 100 percent of the time for 10 of the last 16 months, and 99.8 percent of the time or better in the remaining months.
In comparison, a September report from the VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) reported that there were 826 major performance incidents – such as outages – to the EHR system from Oct. 24, 2020 (the initial EHR system go-live), through March 31, 2024.
As of early December, the VA noted it has been over 200 days since the last outage. The average user now experiences “near zero interruptions (freezes or delays, for example) per day,” the agency said.
Since the beginning of the reset period, veteran outpatient trust scores have increased at all EHR sites. Additionally, clinician and staff satisfaction with the EHR system has increased each year since 2022 – with employees using phrases in surveys like “the EHR is available when I need it” and “this EHR enables me to deliver high-quality care.”
During the reset period, the VA also deployed the EHR system at the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center (Lovell FHCC) near Chicago – the only healthcare facility to serve both Department of Defense (DoD) and VA patients.
VA Under Secretary for Health Shereef Elnahal touted this deployment as the agency’s “most successful deployment” yet due in part to the teamwork between VA and DoD, as well as the “significant learnings over the last several years.”
“VA is ready to begin planning for the next Federal EHR deployments in 2026, while at the same time remaining committed to the continuous improvement efforts that have been our focus for the past 18 months,” said Acting Program Executive Director of the EHRM Integration Office Neil Evans. “We’re going to keep listening to and learning from veterans and VA staff every step of the way.”
The VA said it will kick off pre-deployment activities “in the coming weeks,” adding that given the necessary preparation time, the Michigan facilities are expected to go live with the system in mid-2026.
