Aurora Medical Group: EMR Implementation

Situation
 
Aurora Medical Group (AMG) encompasses 720 primary-care and specialty physicians. Aurora Medical Group is part of Aurora Health Care, a not-for-profit health care provider.  The AMG Information Technology team has worked to deploy Electronic Medical Record (EMR) application software to its 135 clinics over the past 12 years. The Aurora team required additional resources to complete the deployment of the EMR to the final 35 clinics.

Strategy
 
Wipfli’s project managers were tasked with scope definition, current and future state process definition, gap analysis, resource management across multiple departments, and issue management and resolution. In addition, Wipfli provided application support resources to provide direct clinic support during the go-lives.  Further, Wipfli provided assistance in the areas of process improvement for the various clinics by helping clinic personnel determine the most efficient ways to manage clinical processes.

Benefits
 
Wipfli’s experience in health care, coupled with their expertise in EMR implementations and their experience in conducting process improvement efforts, was an asset to the project. “Without Wipfli’s participation, the process improvement project would have been more difficult, less successful, and far less fun,” relates A. J. Capelli, M.D., S.M.

The Wipfli team successfully assisted AMG in deploying the EMR on time, on budget, with minimal negative impact to physician performance, and ultimately improving patient care and safety. Physicians at Aurora were able to increase patient volume because of the efficiencies their clinics gained by converting from paper charts to electronic medical records.