Overview:
Northwest Community Healthcare is a comprehensive patient-centered system of care in Illinois, that serves more than 350,000 outpatients each year, and more than 20,000 inpatients treated annually at its 496-bed acute care hospital in Arlington Heights. NCH has a medical staff of more than 1,000 physicians, which includes both board-certified primary care doctors and specialists of the NCH Medical Group.
In late 2013, NCG kicked off an 18 month project to implement Epic, , an electronic universal health record that stores patient data in one secure database and enables NCH caregivers to access patients' records at any time from any location.
Outcome:
NCH’s successful Epic implementationn spanned more than 530 clinical workflows across the entire system of care, including the hospital; more than 20 physician offices, four Immediate Care Centers, and eight outpatient physical rehabilitation centers.
Many of NCH’s goals focused on improving patient access to personal health information and increasing patient engagement. Between May 1 and October 30 of 2015, more than 3,000 patients signed up for MyChart, Epic’s patient portal. NCH takes particular pride in one 99-year-old patient who signed up the very first day MyChart became available.
Lessons Learned:
NCH has found that implementing Epic has improved communication between clinicians, allowed patient data to be readily available across all units, and has saved time for clinicians who no longer chase down patient charts.