Electronic Health Records

Thanks to the leadership of our Chief Information Officer and Vice President of IT, Shafiq Rab, his staff and our partnership with EPIC, we have forever transformed the way we practice medicine and care for our patients at Orange Regional. We experienced one of the best conversions in the nation, going from a paper record to an electronic record for each patient virtually overnight. Additionally, we have already achieved over 90% Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE). This is a remarkable accomplishment that improves the accuracy of orders for patients and minimizes delays in care and treatment.

The EPIC system redefines how physicians practice medicine and also provides direct access to best practice methods. It provides us the ability to maintain a single, complete and current patient medical record, thereby enhancing patient safety and accuracy of medical history, outcomes and continuity of care. Patient information is derived off of a single database for inpatient care, ambulatory care and care provided in the private offices of our physicians who choose to participate, allowing clinicians to capture clinical data instantly and more efficiently. Further, the system helps to ensure compliance with organizational best practices at every point in the care process.

Having a state-of-the-art electronic health record system is new and exciting. However, the real benefit is our ability to enhance patient safety, improve patient outcomes, consistently utilize best practices and increase communication of patient information to all necessary clinicians. As we learn to optimize the system in the future, we will have the capability to tap into advanced research using the clinical information now readily available to us.

Many of our employees and physicians have embraced our new technology by contributing to the developments of our EHR functionalities, becoming super users, developing training programs or being on stand-by for support. No matter what your role, together we have taken a huge leap forward. I sincerely appreciate your hard work and dedication.

Thank you for doing your part to make the EPIC “go live” a great success! We will continue to rely on your participation. It is well-known that successful implementations depend on employee engagement. Please stay calm and be patient. I believe we are all eager to benefit from a system that will improve our workflow, increase efficiency and allow us to enhance the quality of care we deliver to our patients.