Hospitals have been either implementing or replacing their core electronic health record (EHR) in recent years. The work has included the entire suite of applications that make up the revenue cycle, patient access, and advanced clinicals in both inpatient and outpatient settings. But as we look beyond the core EHR, there is much more potential for technology.

This week at UMHS, clinicians and staff did a two day “deep dive” into the next group of applications as we move forward with our EHR. Teams from transplant, anesthesiology, radiology, cardiology, and home care reviewed Epic’s capabilities so we can decide what will be included in our next phase of work – what we call MiChart Stage 4. These important assessments require an in-depth review of current capabilities, and an understanding of the product roadmap. Continue reading →

Walking down the hall at our University Hospital last week, I ran into a UMHS senior leader I hadn’t seen in weeks. He asked me how MiChart was going – that’s the program name for our new integrated electronic health record. I said “very well.” I joked there are no picket lines outside my office and I’m not getting nastygram emails. I’m actually getting to focus on a lot of other things now, compared to those first few weeks after our MiChart Stage 3 inpatient go live two months ago. Our clinicians and other staff are adapting pretty well and, overall, things are going smoothly.

With this stage of our Epic implementation completed, we now have an integrated system across ambulatory, inpatient, hospital outpatient departments, and revenue cycle. Continue reading →