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San Francisco Considering $36M Extension as Work Continues on New EHR System

The city and county of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote Tuesday afternoon on a $36.3 million contract amendment with Cerner Health Services that will support the transition to a new, unified electronic health record system.

The city and county of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors proposed a $36.3 million contract amendment with Cerner Health Services that will support the transition to a new, unified electronic health record system on Tuesday. The proposed amendment was sent to subcommittee for review.

If approved, the amendment would extend an existing contract another three years, to June 2020, and also increase expenditures on the system by almost $36.3 million a year. The total agreement is not to exceed $88.5 million.

The board represents both San Francisco's city and county governments.

The contract amendment will be reviewed by the board’s budget and finance subcommittee prior to being placed on a future agenda. The additional funds would pay for new clinical and financial software to facilitate the transition to the new system.

The previous system was serviced by Siemens Medical Solutions USA Inc. until April 2015, when it was transferred to Cerner.


The current agreement would not end until all previous systems are decommissioned and transitioned to the new electronic health record system.

A March 7 update from the S.F. Department of Public Health summarizes the most recent work on a unified EHR system. According to the timeline, work on an RFP and contracting will continue through the rest of 2017, and a phased go-live and rollout could occur in 2019 and 2020. The city-county initially explored the possibility of developing a shared EHR system with the University of California San Francisco, but decided in late 2016 to not go in that direction.

Kayla Nick-Kearney was a staff writer for Techwire from March 2017 through January 2019.