Improving the Patient / Provider Experience
The WIEUG Improving the Patient / Provider Experience Pillar
This strategic pillar plays an integral role in providing programs that highlight ways that we as a collaborative team can improve patient care coordination for our patients and improve efficiencies / decrease the workload for our providers. There are numerous programs under this pillar - including:
- Care Channel Coordination and Technology integration
- Advanced Care Planning
- Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare
- Revenue Cycle Optimization
- Ax the Fax
WHY DOES THIS MATTER?
Interoperability is more than just improving the exchange of data between systems - it also improves internal workflows for your providers and patients. The purpose of this program is to examine how we can improve communications between external providers and optimize our connections with patients. This program has it's eye on the environment and efficiency! Let's decrease paper waste and manual scanning / abstracting workflows! Let's look for ways to improves care coordination and efficiencies across partners for shared patients! This program strives to improve the overall shared patient experience, while also ensuring that provider efficiency and satisfaction remain high priority goals for each solution presented.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
All of the sessions in this program are open to anyone and we encourage you to review the session details to determine which sessions would be beneficial or interesting for you to join. Some of these (like SER, Ax the Fax, Advanced Care Planning, Cancer outcomes and SDOH) are more project like in nature and consistent participation is encouraged, while others (like Care Channel Coordination / Technology Integration, Rev Cycle Optimization and AI in HCOs) are meant to be more ala carte in nature and can be chosen based on your interests at the session level.
➢ This is a program that goes outside of Interoperability and so has a wide breadth of roles that may be interested / included.
➢ Don’t be shy – join a session today to hear a spectrum of perspectives across a variety of topics!
WHAT IS THE TIMING / CADENCE?
• The majority of these sessions follow a quarterly or monthly cadence and there is no end in sight for what we can discuss.
• Most have already begun, but it’s not too late to join.
WHAT GROUPS WILL MEET?
CARE COORDINATION AND TECHNOLOGY INTEGRATION focus team
This series is open to anyone and we encourage you to review the session details to determine which sessions would be beneficial or interesting for you to join. All will present a different flavor and perspective around how meeting patients in the channel of their choice, combined with integrating technology in “classic” face to face encounters and inpatient stays and incorporating patient obtained data not only improve patient outcomes but have a definitive ROI.
- Let’s think differently about patient care.
- Let’s consider out of the box solutions.
- Let’s drive up ROI without sacrificing patient and provide satisfaction (in fact, let’s improve it)
PROGRAM OVERVIEW AND PLAN:
We have entered an era in which the face-to-face channel is no longer the only option available for care delivery. There are a spectrum of options available like telehealth, video visits, eHealth portals and online options that enable patient’s to receive care based on their own preferences. In addition, there has been an explosion of solutions (application and technical platforms) that are available that integrate with Epic that can support a variety of use cases.
This WIEUG program will include a series of presentations and discussions to explore emerging Care Channel and Technology Integration trends and best practices.
TIMING / CADENCE:
- August 2025 through February 2026
- Monthly Sessions
- This is a pick and choose your own adventure – consider this program ala carte
WHO DO WE HAVE LINED UP?
- DrFirst (medication care coordination)
- Epic
- Virtusense (virtual monitoring)
- CEC (integration optimization)
- Qvera (governance / interface consolidation)
- Trust Commerce (patient payment integration)
Ax the Fax
WHY DOES THIS MATTER?
The goal of this program is to shore up the foundational functionality and increase the utilization of solutions that decrease the amount of faxing and manual communications between Epic organizations.
This series of sessions and groups will explore how to use Epic and the CE framework to improve end-user efficiency and Epic to Epic communications.
WHAT IS THE PLAN FOR THE PROGRAM?
There are multiple groups that are meeting to help the regional user group improve efficiency, decrease manual workflows and increase the use of electronic channels for inter-org communication. Most of the groups meet quarterly; as additional focus projects are identified, groups may meet monthly until deliverables have been identified. This includes the following groups:
- SER / Provider Directory Management Group
- Ax the Fax Groups
- Outside Messaging for Providers
- CERM
These programs rely in the right staff being at sessions to really drive utilization and adoption of best practices. This includes:
- CE Analysts
- SER / Provider Directory owners
- HIM Staff
- MyChart / DXO Routing SMEs
Revenue Cycle Optimization
A key workflow that has implications for both providers as well as patients is how well the end-to-end revenue cycle workflow is set up to efficiently, accurately, and transparently register, code and collect payments (from patients and payers) for services performed.
We have scheduled, beginning in September, monthly sessions and presentations to discuss the following topics:
1.Partner Perspectives (this program will begin with four presentations by partners (including Epic).
2.RUG Discussion / Info Sharing Sessions:
1.Prior Authorization Best Practices
2.Registration / Scheduling Implications
3.Billing / Coding Optimization
4.Effectively Managing Denials
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
The presentation portion of this series is open to anyone and we encourage you to review the session details to determine which sessions would be beneficial or interesting for you to join. As we move into discussion based sessions in 2026, we welcome anyone to the table, but feel that if you are part of the following teams, you may really benefit :
- Prior Authorization,
- Reg/sched,
- Billing/Coding,
- Denials,
- medical directors / provider informatics or
- payor platform teams
WHO DO WE HAVE LINED UP?
We have lined up the following partners to participate in this program with us:
- Cardamom (global best practices)
- Arintra (rev cycle deep dive)
- Epic (current best practices and a look to the future)
- SphereCommerce (Integrating Payments)
WHAT IS THE TIMING/CADENCE?
- Kicks off January 2026
- Monthly Sessions
- This is a pick and choose your own adventure – consider this program ala carte
dISCUSSION GROUPS
registration / scheduling
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this team to share best practices and information about your set-up in order to offer options for your peers for how to effectively set up registration and scheduling to support efficient and comprehensive billing. This is one sub-group that will meet under the rev Cycle Optimization Program.
CADENCE:
Every four months
billing / coding
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this team to share best practices and information about your set-up in order to offer options for your peers for how to effectively set up billing and coding workflows This is one sub-group that will meet under the rev Cycle Optimization Program.
CADENCE:
Every four months
prior authorization / denials management
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this team to share best practices and information about your set-up in order to offer options for your peers for how to effectively set up billing and coding workflows. This is one sub-group that will meet under the rev Cycle Optimization Program.
CADENCE:
Every four months
AI in HCOs
It seems as if AI solutions and opportunities are everywhere. They support more efficient and strategic provider documentation, improving data integration and patient interactions and optimizing technology solutions. But with the explosion of this new technology comes questions…
Where to begin? How to prioritize? What do you avoid?
This focus series will look at AI from a number of lenses and will help sort through the quagmire of options available for consideration.
WHAT IS THE PLAN FOR THE PROGRAM?
We have scheduled monthly sessions to discuss the following topics:
- Member organization governance and solutions.
- Partner solution deep dives
- Epic’s sphere of influence and cost options to consider.
- Discussion-based use case exploration for the following areas:
- Providers (ambient, ancillary, radiology)
- Rev cycle options
- Patient-related integrations and interactions
- Solutions that support IT teams
WHAT IS THE TIMING/CADENCE?
- August 2025 through Q1 2026
- Monthly Sessions
- This is a pick and choose your own adventure – consider this program ala carte
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
This series is open to anyone and we encourage you to review the session details to determine which sessions would be beneficial or interesting for you to join. All will present a different flavor and perspective around how AI can be strategically utilized to not only improve patient outcomes but have a definitive ROI.
- Let’s think differently about AI in all it’s forms.
- Let’s see what Epic is thinking about it’s future development and how AI will be used.
- Let’s drive up ROI without sacrificing the human touch.
WHO DO WE HAVE LINED UP?
1.DrFirst (provider solutions)
2.Epic
3.Arintra (rev cycle deep dive)
4.Cardamom (system optimization)
5.TEK Systems (integration with MI)
6.Harmony HIT (data management)
Discussion groups
Provider / Clinical Workflow
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this discussion based group to learn from your peers the AI related solutions that they have implemented to support provider / clinical workflows.
CADENCE:
Twice a year
Front end
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this discussion based group to learn from your peers the AI related solutions that they have implemented to support back-end workflows, including those related to front end workflows including registration / HIM / patient communication.
CADENCE:
Twice a year
baCK END
MAIN OBJECTIVES:
Join this discussion based group to learn from your peers the AI related solutions that they have implemented to support back-end workflows, including those related to billing / coding and health maintenance / registries.
CADENCE:
Twice a year
Advanced Care Planning
Many organizations meet regulations around ACP through paper forms and a more manual workflow. Although Epic has released functionality to support, most organizations readily admit that the terms, workflows, doc types and roles and responsibilities that collect and govern the advanced care planning process can vary within and between facilities. If you consider the cross organization perspective, there is a lot that could be done within regions to standardize and improve the collection and reconciliation of this information.
This focus series will look at advanced care planning through several lens, with the ultimate goal of offering organizations recommended options to consider, including:
- workflow(s),
- key terms and definitions
- documentation types,
- governance structures,
- monitoring reports
WHAT ARE GOALS?
Minimum: introduce recommended standard naming conventions for these documents across organizations so that they are easier to identify and find regardless of the org / instance of Epic.
Ultimately: Determine if there is a way to share these documents across Epic instances so that patient’s do not need to submit copies at every org that they receive care. Determine how to properly identify the latest version, archive / store previous versions and work collaboratively across orgs for workflows that pertain to the updating of these documents.
WHAT IS THE TIMING/CADENCE?
- October 2025 through October 2026
- Monthly Sessions
- This is considered a “project” oriented series, which means that consistent participation is appreciated and recommended
WHO DO WE HAVE LINED UP?
We have lined up the following member organizations leads to participate in this program with us:
1. HSHS (recently completed a project to improve their advanced care planning workflows
2.Emplify (ranked as the “best place to die” because of their comprehensive advanced care planning workflow)
https://www.epicshare.org/share-and-learn/normalizing-advance-care-planning-gives-patients-power-and-families-peace-of-mind
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
If you are part of the ACP team, Home Health, Hospice, Case Management, Doc Type Governance, Reporting, HIM – we need you.
IMPROVING THE PATIENT / PROVIDER EXPERIENCE NOTES AND DOCUMENTS
- OPTIMIZING OUTSIDE MESSAGING TRAINING TEMPLATE
- OUTSIDE MESSAGING SBAR
- OUTSIDE MESSAGING - AX THE FAX BUILD CHECKLIST
- PATIENT SEARCH RECOMMENDATIONS - APPROVED REGIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS
- SER / Provider Directory Optimization Focus Team
- Ax the Fax Focus Team
- Care Channel Coordination / Tech Integration Focus Team
- AI in HCOs Focus Team
- Rev Cycle Optimization Focus Team
- Advanced Care Planning Focus Team
- Cosmos Datathons Event Team
- SDOH Focus Team
