'The confusion created by Microsoft and its choice of the word 'Vista' is an affront to the people who take care of our nation's veterans,' said Barbara Boykin, Chairman of the VistA Software Alliance, as she today denounced Microsoft's choice of the name 'Windows Vista' for the new version of the Windows operating system.

"VistA," she explained, is the Veterans Administration's (VA) publicly-available healthcare software.

"For over two decades, VistA has been used on a daily basis by the VA's 193,000 healthcare professionals to provide healthcare to millions of veterans in 163 hospitals, 135 nursing homes, and 850 clinics," said Boykin, adding:

"The VistA software enables these caring professionals to provide our veterans with some of the best healthcare in the nation. Microsoft is demeaning their passion and dedication to our veterans by expropriating the name Vista."

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is set to release VistA-Office EHR within a few days. This is a version of VistA specifically tailored for medical practices. VistA-Office EHR will be a low-cost electronic medical record system available to physicians nationwide.

"The timing of Microsoft's announcement is most unfortunate," said Maury Pepper, Chairman of WorldVistA. "Microsoft is aware of the VA's use of 'VistA' and yet insists on detracting from the nationwide effort to provide the VistA electronic health record to physicians throughout the country by creating confusion in the IT industry. Our healthcare system has long been in need of a truly affordable electronic medical record, and just as one becomes available, Microsoft has created a huge distraction."

VistA and VistA-Office EHR are an important part of a national effort to fully computerize the nation's healthcare system within ten years. Both Boykin and Pepper agree that Microsoft's use of the Vista name could seriously impede this effort. Microsoft's choice of Windows Vista, they say, "will cause confusion in the emerging VistA marketplace and fear of litigation among vendors who provide VistA and VistA Office HER-related services, given Microsoft's typically aggressive enforcement of its trademarks."

For its part, Microsoft emphasizes that its choice is "Windows Vista" (two words) not "Vista" and that their (trademarked) name is therefore a unique combination, with one of the two words being the word in the whole dictionary most closely associated with Microsoft.