The U.K.-based Royal Devon & Exeter NHS Foundation Trust's board has approved a £42m (roughly $55 million) clinical transformation program dubbed My Care, which includes the implementation of an Epic EHR, the hospital confirmed June 6.
Here are three things to know about the EHR implementation:
1. The My Care program will transition patients' records — including medical history, current medications and latest test results — to an EHR, as Royal Devon & Exeter's current record system is largely paper-based.
2. Royal Devon & Exeter intends to go live on the Epic EHR in summer 2020. However, it will begin preparing for the implementation in September, which will likely include patient engagement, a clinical services redesign and staff training, among other initiatives.
3. After the Epic EHR implementation, patients will have access to their medical history, test results and appointment scheduling via Epic's patient portal MyChart.
"Alongside Cambridge University Hospitals, Great Ormond Street Hospital and University College London Hospitals, RD&E now joins a growing cohort of the United Kingdom's health IT leaders who are part of an Epic community where innovation and collaboration are improving patient care," Epic CEO and Founder Judy Faulkner said in a June 6 statement.