Laxmi Patel | Chief Strategy Officer
Epic has changed the face of healthcare; becoming the one source of truth and reporting for many organizations. It provides a wide range of comprehensive functionalities across patient experience, clinical documentation, reporting, and the revenue cycle. It has truly transformed the patient experience with portals for convenient appointment scheduling, viewing of medical records, and the ability for patients to easily communicate with their providers. It’s highly customizable and configurable based upon the needs of the organization and can be tailored to tie in with existing workflows. Its interoperability allows streamlined communication and workflows across internal departments with rich data reporting and actionable insights to drive decision making. Lastly, given the critical importance of quality clinical data in healthcare pared with regulatory compliance such as HIPAA, Meaningful Use and MACRA, Epic helps organizations maintain data security and avoid compliance related fines and penalties.
Regarding the revenue cycle, Epic includes coding tools that help providers and clinical staff accurately code procedures and diagnoses to ensure they are accurately reimbursed for services. It also automates the charge capture workflow, provides tools for managing the claims process, and includes tools for managing patient billing- all which help healthcare organizations optimize their revenue cycle and financial performance.
Epic is a truly invaluable asset when used to its fullest potential. With all the functionality and customization available, features can go misused or unused altogether. Much strategic prework is required before making the move to implement a new instance or upgrade an existing one; extensive training is required for front-end workers to ensure they are using it to its fullest potential, and data analysts need to understand the power of the insights they can access and how to leverage them. The investment of a new or upgrading your EHR can cost hundreds of millions of dollars, so making sure you are getting the most out of that investment is critical.
Given the incredible value that Epic can provide, there are steps those undertaking a new implementation should consider to ensure they are ready for and an efficient and effective go-live. Similarly, organizations that are currently using Epic should evaluate the steps below and take measures to ensure they are getting the most out of their investment. It’s never too late to optimize your existing platform. Please consider the following:
