Epic Glossary of Terms:
Access
Epic products can be broadly grouped into clinical, revenue, and access applications. ADT,
Prelude, Cadence, Welcome, and Referrals comprise the Access group of products.
ADT
Short for Admission/Discharge/Transfer. A system for tracking inpatient visits. Used by
organizations to track inpatients from their arrival (admission), to their movements inside the
hospital (transfer), to their departure (discharge).
ancillary services
Support services other than room & board, medical services, or nursing services that are
provided to patients in the course of care. These services include laboratory, radiology,
pharmacy, and physical therapy.
Anesthesia
Epic's Anesthesia Information Management System (AIMS) product.
application
A software product, such as one created or sold by Epic.
ASAP
Epic's emergency department information system application.
batch
Several charts grouped together. Batches enable users to check charts in and out as a group
rather than one at a time.
Beacon
Epic's medical oncology product.
bidirectional interface
An interface that consists of both an incoming and outgoing component. That is, it can both
send and receive interface messages.
big bang
Implementation approach in which all users begin using a new software system at the same time.
; Example: We recommend the big bang approach, in which you go live with all of your
departments at once.
Break-the-Glass
An Epic feature that allows users to gain emergency access to a restricted patient record. The act
of gaining access to the restricted record is called breaking the glass. An audit trail stores details
of the event when a user chooses to break the glass, and an In Basket message can be sent to
the user's supervisor to ensure that the access was warranted.
Bridges
The Epic toolkit for interfacing Epic applications with external systems, including interface profiles
and utilities for configuring and maintaining interfaces.
Business Intelligence Developer (BID)
Business Intelligence Developers are typically full-time employees that analyze, provide
specifications, and write reports for the applications in their cluster.
Caché
Programming language used in Epic applications. Caché is also a database management system
and Chronicles is built on top of it. We use it to run our software by building master files and
functions (code).
Cadence Enterprise Scheduling
The name of Epics Appointment Scheduling product; an Epic division.
Care Everywhere
An application that provides access at the point of care to the patient's medical records from
other organizations. Note: Prior to the Spring 2008 release, Care Everywhere referred to an
application that could be used by very large, single organizations to spread their production
environment over several instances of Epic software. That application, which is now called
IntraConnect, is used for scalability purposes only, not for communication between different
healthcare organizations.
Clinical
Relating to the Epic applications that deal with the observation and treatment of patients, as
opposed to financial or technical applications. For example, EpicCare Ambulatory or EpicCare
Inpatient.
Cogito
Epic's enterprise intelligence suite, which includes everything related to Epic reporting and
analytics (Clarity, Radar, Reporting Workbench, data warehouse, Analytics). Short for "Cogito
ergo sum Enterprise Intelligence.
Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE)
Process by which physicians enter orders in the system electronically.
Cupid
Epic's cardiology application. This application was formerly known as Cardiant.
dashboard
A screen on which data collected from various sources appears in an accessible format.
Dashboards typically contain charts, graphs, and other graphics so users can do a quick analysis
of various metrics. Epic provides dashboards using two tools: Radar and SAP BusinessObjects.
Radar dashboards are built in Hyperspace. These personalizable home pages can contain graphs,
reports, links, and other data. Radar dashboards mostly contain operational reporting data and
get their data from Chronicles. The SAP BusinessObjects dashboards are built with Xcelsius and
can be accessed in Hyperspace through the integration with InfoView. BusinessObjects
dashboards contain analytical data and get their data from Clarity.
Data Courier
Hyperspace utility used to import static records or custom category list entries from one
environment to another. Can also refer to Text-side Data Courier
data warehouse
In industry terms, a data warehouse is a repository of an organization's electronically stored data,
designed to facilitate reporting and analysis. In simpler terms, a data warehouse is a collection of
a large amount of data, often from many different systems. Data warehouses often provide a
common data model for all data of interest regardless of the data's source. This common
structure makes it easier to report on and analyze information from many different sources. ;
Epic's Clarity database is similar to a data warehouse, because it collects data to facilitate
reporting and analysis. However, the Clarity database contains data only from Epic's Chronicles
database and data that enters Chronicles from an interfaced system. Affiliated systems whose
data doesn't enter Chronicles is not available in Clarity.
Epic button
The button marked "Epic" at the upper left corner of the screen. It is always visible in Hyperspace
and allows access to various tools, options, and activities.
Go-Live Readiness Assessment
A global evaluation of all factors contributing to go-live in preparation for the implementation of
Epic software. This includes examination of planning, hardware, system build, and end-user
training. GLRAs are held at 120, 90, 60, and 30 days prior to go-live.
HIM
A suite of products that are each sold separately, installed separately, and frequently accessed by
different groups of users in the medical records department of a healthcare organization. Epic's
HIM suite includes Chart Tracking, Deficiency Tracking, Release of Information, and Coding &
Abstracting.
Hyperspace
The integrated platform that hosts most Epic applications.
interface
A software application used to send information to or receive information from another system; a
place at which independent systems meet and act on or communicate with each other.
key performance indicator (KPI)
Epic assists customers with measuring KPIs by providing a package of reports related to the
business metrics that it considers crucial to monitoring the health of a customer system.
Measuring KPIs is part of the Good Install program.
MyChart
Epic application that allows patients to view their medical records and interact with their
physicians over the Internet.
Nova
Epic-released tool used for release note management, assignment, and review.
physician champion
A physician representative who participates in system design, configuration, and training.
Physician champions add valuable clinical input to the install from the physician perspective.
They communicate physician needs to the project team, as well as communicate project team
progress to the physician community. Physician champions often attend the Physician's Advisory
Council at Epic and sometimes participate in steering committees and hold other executive
leadership roles.
playground
Common term given to an environment in which trainees are allowed to practice.
Radar
Epic's Information Center. A portal that hosts personalizable home pages that show Epic data,
reports, and links to other pages.
Radiant
Epic's radiology application.
Reporting Workbench
An Epic tool that provides flexible, template-based reporting integrated with Hyperspace.
Rover
Epic's medication administration application designed to run on handheld devices.
Single Billing Office
Single Billing Office mode offers the highest level of integration available in Epic's billing suite,
blending the functionality of both Resolute Hospital Billing and Resolute Professional Billing into
one consolidated billing system.
SmartForm
A customizable form in Hyperspace used for gathering clinical and other patient data.
SME
Subject matter expert
Stork
Epic's obstetric application.
super user
An end user who is skilled at using Epic software. Super users often help with site support and
end-user training.
Training Environment
An environment specifically built and maintained for end user training.
Willow Inpatient
Epic application designed to support the workflows and routines familiar to most health care
professionals in inpatient pharmacy settings.
wizard
Workflow in which you proceed through forms in a pre-determined way.
Workflow
A collection of forms arranged in a specific order for collecting and editing information. For
example, the registration activity uses records in the Workflow (HFL) master file to organize the
forms it includes.