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February 23, 2023

In this issue


  • Supporting Your Practice
  • Medicare ACO programs reminder
  • Epic Updates
  • Leadership Announcements
  • Black History Month
  • CME



Note: When accessing APP Pro links below, you may need to sign in again if you are not taken directly to the referenced page or information.

Supporting Your Practice

Clinical Integration updates: As a reminder, appeals close at 5 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 24. View the latest program update


Population Health Outreach: We are conducting the following patient outreach on your behalf to support quality outcomes and close quality care gaps. Learn more.


Acute kidney injury surgical prevention Initiative coming soon: Post-operative acute kidney injury (AKI) is a top complication at Advocate Health Care. We’re launching a surgical prevention initiative to reduce hospital acquired AKI with new evidence-based risk assessments and workflow/order sets in Epic, scheduled to go live on April 20.


  • Be prepared: Attend the Acute Kidney Injury Surgical Risk Reduction course on Thursday, March 2 at 4:30 p.m. Learn how to utilize the AKI risk tool, execute workflows based on AKI risk classifications and document diagnoses per Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) definitions. Register here.
  • Learn more: Readiness details will be shared in early April. Contact Debra O’Connor, DO or Rebecca Hernandez with any questions or if you are interested in joining local, site-based AKI collaborative teams.


Voting for U.S. News Best Hospital: Voting is now open for the 2023-2024 U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals list. You can help bring attention to Advocate Health Care hospitals and the excellent care you and your teams provide every day by voting in the annual physician survey. This survey counts for about 15% of a hospital’s overall score. See who's eligible and how to vote.


Advancing Research:  

Medicare ACO Programs Reminder 

As a reminder, membership in APP for primary care physicians and APCs requires that you participate in our Medicare Shared Savings Program or ACO REACH. We have heard of several external organizations that are asking our primary care physicians and APCs to join their MSSP or ACO REACH programs. Since you can only participate in one MSSP or ACO REACH program, joining a non-APP program would mean you were no longer an APP member. If you have been contacted by another organization and you have questions or concerns, contact your local Value-Based Care Director. 

Epic Updates

Epic change will enable multiple logins: Effective March 8, it will be easier to log in multiple times without generating an error message. Epic users who log into Citrix Workspace without securing Epic at their previous workstation or device will now have two options: cancel the new login or log out of the previous session and start a new one. See this screenshot. This change makes it easier for users who frequently move from location to location at a facility to end previous sessions and log into Epic from another workstation.


Next Epic upgrade April 19: To continuously improve our use of Epic in providing safe and efficient care for our patients, we conduct periodic upgrades. Watch for more information, including education dates and materials and additional resources.


Daylight savings time in Epic: The spring daylight savings time event will occur on March 12. Like last year, Epic will not be taken down during the daylight savings time transition period. The repetition of the 1 a.m. hour may result in unique situations that those accessing Epic during this time should be prepared to manage. Learn more.


Epic Update - Ambulatory Epic Connect: Cosign orders – declined, Schedule Optimization Go-Live and more.


Epic Update - Hospital edition for Physicians and APCs: CancelRx/Rx change, new timeline activity, estimate discharge date will no longer auto-populate the discharge order and more.

Leadership Announcements

Ovinkansola Okubanjo, MD, has been appointed to the position of Medical Director, DE&I for Advocate Health – Midwest Medical Group. Learn more.


Latest Service Line Medical Directors Announced: As part of our ongoing Service Line integration efforts, see the latest Service Line Medical Director leader announcements.

Black History Month is Ongoing

From past leaders to current visionaries, their collective achievements and impact continues to inspire how we work and who we want to be as an organization - helping current and future generations live healthy and happy lives. Read our stories: English | Spanish

Continuing Medical Education

Get Climate Smart: Extreme weather and communication with patients

March 1 and 20, noon-1 p.m.


Join the last two webinars covering the impact of climate change on our patients' and communities’ health. On March 1, learn what your team can do to manage and care for your patients' acute illness or chronic disease in extreme weather. On March 20, learn how to use evidence-based communication strategies to initiate the discussion on how their health and climate change are linked.

Register

Upcoming CME

March 1: Narrative Medicine, breathwork, and three minute mental makeover 

March 1: Get Climate Smart | Extreme weather

March 2: Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) surgical risk reduction

March 8: Polyvagal theory and treatment of trauma and stress-related diagnosis

March 16: MEDtalks: Biosimilars in Inflammatory Diseases - Why we all should care

March 17: 3rd Annual Multidisciplinary Critical Care Symposium (In-person/virtual)

March 20: Get Climate Smart | Communication with patients

March 25: 23rd Annual Cardiovascular Disease Symposium (In-person only/ABIM MOC credit)

April 12: Integrative Mental Health

April 21: Pediatrics in Review Spring Symposium

April 28: Hot Topics in Pediatric Surgical Subspecialties (In-person)