April 2, 2021
AUSTIN, TX – Central Texas Community Health Centers dba CommUnityCare, a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) striving to achieve health equity, today announced that it launched Epic’s healthcare software. Epic is used by leading medical centers and FQHCs, and 250 million patients worldwide have a health record in Epic.
The new system will further CommUnityCare’s mission to strengthen the health and well-being of the communities it serves by providing a single, comprehensive, digital health record for each patient that can be easily shared by healthcare providers and caregivers to improve continuity of care.
”As a large safety net provider, we provide care for those most at risk for an adverse health outcome given that almost 60% of the approximate 125,000 patients we serve annually are uninsured with 90% plus of our patients identified as low income.” said CommUnityCare’s CEO Jaeson Fournier, DC, MPH. He further stated, “In order to achieve greater health equity for those we serve, CommUnityCare needed a health records system inclusive of robust point of care decision support, population health analytics, and enhanced patient engagement functionality. Epic is and was the right solution and provides the state-of-the-art tool that our care teams, clinicians and patients have needed and deserved.”
Seven weeks ahead of the planned launch of Epic, CommUnityCare began using the software at its vaccine clinics, which have played an important role in providing COVID-19 vaccinations to underserved communities. Both Rosewood Zaragosa and Burleson vaccine clinics administered up to 500 vaccines daily, primarily to Latino and African American individuals, who are part of a population disproportionately affected by the pandemic. At a collaborative mass vaccination site, staff and volunteers are using Epic’s mobile app, Rover, on iPhones to capture relevant vaccination documentation at the point of inoculation for up to 5,000 daily vaccinations on the weekends thereby substantively decreasing and automating the recording of vaccines given. CMO Dr. Alan Schalscha stated, “The at-risk communities we serve are three times more likely to be diagnosed with COVID and two times more like die from the disease. The utilization of Rover facilitated our primary prevention strategies and ultimately helped save lives.”
Patients and healthcare providers can use Epic to securely share health information, improving continuity of care. Over 7.45 million health records are exchanged each day through Epic’s interoperability network, Care Everywhere, and nearly half of those exchanges are between Epic and non-Epic systems. That means that in most places where a patient receives care, their information will follow, enabling clinicians to provide safer, personalized care. Patients can also choose to share their health information with their caregivers and with any provider who has internet access through Share Everywhere.
CommUnityCare patients will have convenient access to their health information through Epic’s patient app, MyChart. Online or through an app on their phones, patients can use MyChart to schedule appointments, view notes and test results, message their care providers, refill prescriptions, and more.
For more about CommUnityCare visit: www.communitycaretx.org
