Epic Skills Assessment System & Workflow Analysis 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A hospital implements a new Epic-based discharge workflow but notices that readmission rates have not improved three months later. What is the MOST appropriate next analytic step?
- Immediately revert to the old workflow
- Analyze Epic data to determine whether the new workflow is being followed consistently and identify adherence gaps (Correct answer)
- Blame the workflow designer and reassign the project
- Wait twelve months before evaluating outcomes
Correct answer: Analyze Epic data to determine whether the new workflow is being followed consistently and identify adherence gaps
Measuring workflow adherence first determines whether the process itself is the problem or whether implementation fidelity is the barrier to improvement.
Question 2: In Epic workflow analysis, which of the following scenarios BEST illustrates a 'handoff failure'?
- A nurse documents a medication allergy that the prescribing physician never sees before ordering (Correct answer)
- A patient completes a MyChart questionnaire before their appointment
- A physician cosigns a nurse's note within 24 hours
- An order is placed and routed to the correct department
Correct answer: A nurse documents a medication allergy that the prescribing physician never sees before ordering
A handoff failure occurs when critical information does not transfer effectively between care team members, such as an allergy alert that is not visible at the point of ordering.
Question 3: An analyst is designing a workflow for Epic's In Basket to reduce message routing errors. Which configuration element MOST directly controls where incoming messages are directed?
- User security class
- Message routing rules and pool definitions that assign messages based on type, department, or provider (Correct answer)
- Chart audit settings
- Report subscriptions
Correct answer: Message routing rules and pool definitions that assign messages based on type, department, or provider
Epic In Basket routing rules and pools define exactly which role or individual receives each message type, and misconfiguration here is the most common cause of routing errors.
Question 4: When conducting a workflow analysis for a specialty clinic transitioning to Epic, which stakeholder input is MOST critical during the design phase?
- The IT help desk team's ticket backlog
- End users who perform the day-to-day tasks within the workflow being analyzed (Correct answer)
- The organization's legal department
- The Epic vendor's default training materials exclusively
Correct answer: End users who perform the day-to-day tasks within the workflow being analyzed
End users have firsthand knowledge of workflow nuances, exceptions, and pain points that analysts and managers may not be aware of.
Question 5: A workflow analyst is asked to assess the efficiency of Epic's Results Review workflow for hospitalists. Which Epic tool would provide the MOST actionable efficiency data?
- Security audit logs
- Epic's Signal or Radar dashboards showing time-to-review metrics and unacknowledged result volumes (Correct answer)
- MyChart enrollment statistics
- Tapestry payment posting reports
Correct answer: Epic's Signal or Radar dashboards showing time-to-review metrics and unacknowledged result volumes
Signal and Radar dashboards surface operational metrics like unacknowledged results and review lag times, directly informing efficiency improvement efforts.
Question 6: An organization is analyzing whether its Epic-based prior authorization workflow complies with new payer-mandated timeframes. Which approach is MOST rigorous?
- Ask the authorization team whether they think they meet the timeframes
- Extract Epic timestamp data for each authorization step and compare actual turnaround times to payer-required windows (Correct answer)
- Review only denied claims as a proxy for timeliness
- Rely on the payer's own compliance reports
Correct answer: Extract Epic timestamp data for each authorization step and compare actual turnaround times to payer-required windows
Objective Epic timestamp analysis provides the most rigorous, auditable evidence of actual turnaround times versus required compliance windows.
Question 7: Which of the following BEST describes the purpose of a 'conference room pilot' (CRP) in an Epic implementation?
- A test of the data center's physical server environment
- A structured session where end users walk through future-state workflows in Epic to validate the build before go-live (Correct answer)
- A training class for new Epic analysts
- A meeting to review project budget overruns
Correct answer: A structured session where end users walk through future-state workflows in Epic to validate the build before go-live
CRPs allow stakeholders to validate that the Epic build supports their workflows in a realistic simulation before deployment, catching issues early.
Epic Skills Assessment System & Workflow Analysis 4
A hospital implements a new Epic-based discharge workflow but notices that readmission rates have not improved three months later.
What is the MOST appropriate next analytic step?