All things related to Epic certification will flow from here but let’s start at the very beginning… What is Epic and what is Epic certification all about?
Epic is an electronic medical records (EMR)/electronic health records (EHR) system.
EMR vs. EHR
Before we go any further here’s a quick explanation of the difference between these two terms:
- EMR: An EMR is basically an electronic version of a patient’s medical charts. It typically contains what you’d see in an old-school paper chart, information tied into a patient’s medical and treatment history. This might include information that is typically entered by primary care providers (PCP).
- EHR: An EHR contains the clinical information you’d find in an EMR and then some. EHRs include not just information from a patient’s PCP but also other healthcare provider and allied health info. So info from other medical specialists, labs, and any other clinicians involved in caring for a patient would all be part of an EHR.
What is Epic & Epic Certification?
It is an EHR system and as of this writing is also currently one of the most popular EHR systems. It is used by a good number of hospitals and health systems both within and outside of the United States.
Epic software allows different members of a patient’s care team, as well as patients themselves, to easily access patient information. Pretty straightforward.
Implementing the actual software within a hospital or health system really does “take a village” to bring it to life.
From clinicians to software developers, Epic implementation teams go through a training and certification process in one or more modules of the software prior to developing and installing the software. They are then also responsible for supporting the software within the hospital or health system.
The end users of the Epic software are the folks who are involved in caring for the patient in various capacities.
There’s lots more technical and business information about Epic software available on the official Epic website.
Wanna dig deeper? Here are some more Epic-related topics:
- Certification training
- Epic certification process
- List of Epic modules
- Epic Willow certification – I’ll focus on this one because it’s what I know
- Epic certification cost
- Your Epic Q&As answered
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