[h2o-discuss] Linux on the Operating Table?

[John Wilbanks <wilbanks@cyber.law.harvard.edu>]

Interesting -- found this on salon.  It's about the Linux Anesthesia
Modular Device Interface effort (<http://gasnet.med.yale.edu/lamdi/>).
I'm curious as to the folks' opinion on who would be liable if open
source software crashed and a patient died.  Even though my address says
law.harvard.edu, I'm not a lawyer (or in training to be one) so I'm
throwing it out to the rest of you...

<begin snip>

                                Stefan Harms, a resident in the
department of anesthesiology at
                                the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg,
believes that
                                anesthesiologists could use better help.
One part of the answer,
                                he's convinced, is better anesthesia
software -- programs that will
                                monitor and record patient data, conduct
real-time modeling of
                                the effect of different drugs, and even
directly control the infusion
                                of those drugs. Yes, there are
anesthesia machines and software
                                packages that address some of these
jobs, says Harms, but they
                                are either too expensive or they don't
do everything Harms wants.
                                Sure, if you're a hospital with $60,000
to fling about, you can buy
                                a state-of-the art Narkomed 6000 -- but
many hospitals are on a
                                tighter budget.

                                When he isn't in the operating room
taking care of patients,
                                Harms is hacking on the five computers
in his basement. And he
                                thinks he knows how to achieve his dream
of low-cost, reliable
                                anesthesia software -- by going the
open-source route. Last year,
                                Harms founded LAMDI, the Linux
Anesthesia Modular Device
                                Interface. Harms thinks that the
open-source software
                                development model, in which the source
code to a program is
                                made freely available to the general
public for redistribution and
                                modification, offers fruitful
possibilities for addressing
                                anesthesiological software needs.

                                Harms is placing his bets on a central
tenet of open-source
                                ideology -- the belief that freely
available source code encourages
                                a "peer-review" process that produces
software that is less buggy
                                and more reliable than proprietary
"closed-source" software. The
                                theory is that when everyone can hack on
the code, fix problems
                                as they find them, and add their own new
features, the code
                                quickly improves. It has worked for the
Linux-based operating
                                system, says Harms. Why shouldn't it
work for anesthesiology
                                software, where avoiding crashes and
bugs is a life-or-death
                                situation?

                                "There is a compelling argument for open
source just for safety
                                reasons," says Harms. "If you use tools
and software that are not
                                peer-reviewed, you should be more liable
if something goes
                                wrong."

                                But is the anarchic open-source world
really appropriate for the
                                operating room? Who would be liable if
the software crashed and
                                the patient died? Some hacker grad
student at MIT or Stanford?
                                The anesthesiologist? The hospital? Can
free software pay the
                                price of patient mortality?

<end snip>




John Wilbanks
Assistant Director
Berkman Center for Internet and Society
wilbanks@law.harvard.edu
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu