I was in the ED the other day and noticed that they use a mix of Windows 7 and Windows 10. My question is two part.

  1. Do you know of hospitals using Linux?
  2. Besides legacy software and unwanted downtime, is there any reason why they wouldn’t use Linux?
  • Helped my dad do tech support for a doc office. Even simple stuff like glucose meters barely worked on windows 7, and broke with windows 10. The web portal they used required a specific version of internet explorer to function. I think the biggest issue is always going to be how slowly these devices work in terms of drivers and software compatibility. For security and cost reasons, I’d guess.

    • It would be the same if they used Linux, they’d require something like Red Hat 6.0. 😄

      The medical world is technically illiterate and handles a lot of money so the vendors take advantage of that to do heavy lock-in. Everything is tied down to super specific software versions, everything is proprietary, and you pay through the nose for any change.