The Department of Defense (DoD) is planning to award a sole-source contract extension to Leidos to act as the integrator of MHS Genesis, the Pentagon’s multi-billion dollar electronic health record (EHR) system.
According to a notice posted to SAM.gov on Oct. 18, DoD said it plans to award the contract to Leidos no later than July 28, 2025. The department estimates a three-year extension worth $1.131 billion with a transition option for an additional nine months and $263.34 million.
MHS Genesis, originally a 10-year, $4.3 billion contract with Leidos awarded in 2015, aims to share patient records and data with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Oracle Cerner EHR system.
DoD expanded the contract in 2018 to about $5.5 billion to achieve “a single standard baseline solution” with the VA’s EHR and to incorporate the U.S. Coast Guard into the DoD EHR.
According to the Oct. 18 notice, the Program Executive Office, Defense Healthcare Management Systems, said it wanted to wait to “openly compete the role of systems integrator” until the MHS Genesis architecture is migrated to the cloud to “resolve potential vulnerabilities.”
Therefore, the contract extension will include additional work for Leidos, such as “the services associated with migrating to the cloud in addition to the services at a scale and complexity … which are required to support the MHS GENESIS solution into the continuous support phase as a defense business system,” according to the notice.
“The follow-on contract will also include deliverables for system documentation of its processes and procedures and system internal configurations as well as a requirement to cooperate with a third-party contractor the government will engage to ensure the creation of understandable and complete documentation,” it adds.
The sole source justification “is not binding,” according to the notice. Other firms that believe they can fulfill the contract’s requirements can still be considered by the department.
However, winning over the DoD may be difficult, as the notice says that Leidos “is the only known source with the unique MHS GENESIS development, integration, and sustainment knowledge necessary to seamlessly migrate integration and sustainment responsibilities to the cloud and ensure unfettered support of MHS GENESIS during the migration period.”
The Pentagon completed its final deployment of MHS Genesis earlier this year at the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center near Chicago – the only healthcare facility to serve both DoD and VA patients.
In addition to the DoD, the MHS GENESIS solution is also used by the U.S. Coast Guard, the reserve components, the United States Military Entrance Processing Command, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency. According to the notice, deployment to the National Security Agency is also in progress.
