More than 19,000 Novant Health team members now use AI features embedded in its Epic EHR, part of a broader strategy to reduce administrative burden and address the workflow inefficiencies that health system leaders increasingly tie to clinician burnout.
Onyeka Nchege, executive vice president and chief digital and information officer at Winston-Salem, N.C.-based Novant Health, said the deployment is not primarily a technology story. It is a clinician experience story.
“Our approach to optimizing the electronic health record is about much more than viewing it simply as a technology function,” Mr. Nchege told Becker’s. “It’s about creating a better experience for the clinicians and teams who care for our patients every day.”
Novant Health tracks EHR usage through a data-driven monitoring framework that measures time spent on messages and orders, as well as work completed outside scheduled hours.
“Those insights help us identify opportunities to reduce cognitive load, improve efficiency and address factors that can contribute to burnout,” Mr. Nchege said.
Ambient documentation is among the tools already in use, with Novant Health citing it as a mechanism for reducing documentation burden and giving clinicians more time at the point of care. Mr. Nchege framed the tool not as an add-on but as a component of a deliberate deployment strategy tied to evidence of impact.
“Technology alone does not determine retention, but inefficient workflows can significantly impact the clinician experience, which is why our strategy is focused on strategic implementations rather than simply adding more technology,” he said.
Interoperability sits alongside AI as a foundational enabler of the strategy. The goal is to ensure care teams have a complete view of a patient’s health across systems, supporting coordination and decision-making. Mr. Nchege said the two priorities are linked: AI tools are most effective when the underlying data infrastructure allows them to operate across a connected environment.
Looking further ahead, Mr. Nchege described a future state in which the EHR becomes less visible to the clinicians who rely on it.
“We expect the electronic health record to evolve into a system of intelligence and orchestration,” he said. “Ultimately, our goal is for technology to become less visible — working in the background to support clinicians, strengthen care coordination and enable more meaningful interactions between patients and their care teams.”
That vision, Mr. Nchege said, is central to Novant Health’s broader digital transformation strategy.
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