Last week I referred to AHLTA, the Defense Department's electronic health record system, as an acronym that stood for Armed Forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application system. It did when AHLTA was introduced in 2005.
But, comments on the post have shown me the error of my ways. These comments cited an internal Military Heath System CITPO (an acronym which stands for Clinical Information Technology Program Office) Wire from Oct. 11, 2006, which declared AHLTA a proper noun and not an acronym.
I guess any outfit can turn an acronym into a noun, but it does worry me that an arm of the Defense Departmemt has started to tinker around with the English language. Where will this all end?
Nouns today, adjectives tomorrow, and adverbs next year. Who knows what changes in the language will be wrought by Defense personnel. I'm afraid this will lead to an inevitable linguistic degringolade. (I picked that word up in a letter to the editor in the Feb. 23 Financial Times.)
Meanwhile, with a nod to the musician Prince, AHLTA is definitely a noun, formerly know as an acronym.
COMMENTS
Bob,
It's time you found some accurate and current sources in the DoD. CHCS (facility-centric Composite Health Care System) did not transmorgify into AHLTA (the noun, not the unfortunately inspired "Armed Forces Longitu....." well, you remember the rest).
AHLTA (the noun) was a renaming of CHCS II (the enterprise Composite Health Care System II) which was supposed to replace the old, VistA-derived, obsolete MUMPS-based CHCS that had passed its expected lifespan.
The $5B ascribed to AHLTA is not the procurement cost. This figure is the 20 year life-cycle cost for AHLTA, code plus infrastructure procurement, replacement, and maintenance. CHCS, which ran on inexpensive dumb terminals had no maintenance programmed as it was supposed to be retired.
Leonard Gump 04/29/09 11:44 am ET
Now just watch out for a bunch of variations on pronunciation >.
JoeD 03/17/09 03:39 pm ET
I heard that AHLTA is actually an acronym for "Ah Hell, Let's Try Again".
George Timson 03/12/09 04:16 pm ET
Speaking of errors of your ways...
I guess any outfit can turn an acronym into a noun.
"Wire," although it does exist anymore, should be capitalized- WIRE- as it was an acronym for the Weekly Information Report- Electronic. Thanks.
Unknown 03/04/09 08:50 am ET
Nicely put ...
Richard Jones 03/03/09 03:50 pm ET