Alabama Health System Launches Epic EHR to Expand Interoperability

Southeast Health Medical Group, an Alabama-based health system, has launched Epic EHR to boost care quality and streamline interoperability across the health system, according to WDHN in Dothan, Alabama.

The health system said the Epic EHR platform aims to strengthen interoperability between its hospital, medical school, and 22 clinics located across southern Alabama.

“Now by having one record that same information that you gave to the clinic that you were just in about your medications or your allergies or any of your history, now if you showed up at the emergency room, all that information is going to be right there with us. We can see it,” Eric Daffron, chief information officer of Southeast Health Medical Group, said in a statement.

Southeast Health clinicians or clinicians at any hospital on the Epic system can also view or access any patient medical record, which improves clinician communication and patient care, the organization said.

The health system is also boasting its new patient portal, MyChart.

Using the patient portal, a patient can schedule her appointments, place orders for prescription refills, communicate with providers, access health education materials, pay bills online, and view health history and lab results. A patient can access the patient portal on her mobile phone or computer.

The health system said its faculty put up QR codes around its facilities for patients to download the patient portal application.

“We’re really excited for the patients of what they’re going to see with those new functionality,” Daffron said. “There’s an app, you can do it online on the website, so lots of avenues to be able to access MyChart.”

The health system went live with its new EHR system on Saturday.

“This system is used in the top hospitals in the country, so if you look at US News and World Report, the top twenty hospitals, every single one of them are using Epic as their systems,” Daffron concluded. “So we’re very excited to be in the company of those institutions.”

Earlier in February, KLAS awarded Epic Systems the top overall software suite for the 11th straight year. Overall, Epic earned 11 awards in 2021, including the top overall physician practice vendor.

Southeast Health was the first hospital in Alabama to administer the COVID-19 vaccine. The health system worked with Epic to launch the new EHR system early for its community COVID-19 drive-thru vaccine clinic.

In early February, Epic Systems announced 100 COVID-19 vaccination sites across the country had implemented its EHR software, resulting in roughly 500,000 daily vaccinations across traditional clinical settings and mass vaccination sites.

Epic’s EHR software provides its customers with patient outreach tools to reach priority populations, patient scheduling, mobile workflows, and real-time reporting to public health authorities, the vendor said.  

Since January 21, when President Biden released his COVID-19 vaccination strategy, 56 mass vaccination sites leveraged Epic EHR. At that time, Biden called for “as many venues as needed for people to be vaccinated.”

Epic’s goal was to help set up 100 vaccination sites by the end of February. The vendor exceeded that goal in less than a month, and its next goal is to add another 100 locations over the next 30 days, Epic said.

The vendor says increased interoperability allows each health system or vaccination facility to share patient information with both Epic facilities and other providers that do not run Epic EHR software. Facilities can also exchange patient data with state public health departments, which then can forward that data to the CDC.

“Doing what often takes months, health systems have moved in a matter of days and weeks to set up locations with the technology needed to conduct mass vaccinations,” Judy Faulkner, founder and CEO of Epic, said at the time of the announcement.