Epic Cupid: The “Heart” of Your Cardiovascular Information System

When you think of “Cupid” you think of your heart, right?

Well that’s exactly what Epic was going for when assigning that name to their all-encompassing cardiovascular information system module. Epic Cupid gives healthcare providers the opportunity to improve their data management practices, keep track of important cardiovascular health reports, and optimize overall cardiology workflow within their organization.

Read on to learn more about everything Epic Cupid has to offer your cardiology team.

What is Epic Cupid?

Epic’s cardiovascular module was originally released in 2009 as “Cardiant”, but through various system upgrades, updates, and even a name change, Epic Cupid now allows users to experience greater functionality. It also grants access to more information that supports all kinds of procedural workflows within your clinical practice or healthcare system.

The Epic cardiology module gives users increased visibility into structured data and order entry, procedural documentation, managed care practices, schedule organization, and much more, including…

• Structured reporting for better data analytics
• Communication of results from imaging system teams to healthcare providers, patient care teams, and patients
• Use and results of various cardiovascular procedures (i.e. Echo, Cardiac Cath, Stress Testing, etc.)
• Accepted cardiovascular research and practice standards
• Billing and charging processes for cardiovascular appointments, imaging, or procedures

Epic Cupid also allows users to create and share interactive diagrams and structured reporting templates that provide important data and insights concerning specific procedures, measurements, and interventions within the cardiovascular care management system. This way, patients and providers are able to stay up-to-date with valuable information and gain a better understanding of their specific procedures and cardiac measurements.

Integration with Other Systems

Not only does Epic’s comprehensive system integration capabilities allow information, documents, and reports in Cupid to be shared between other modules within Epic, but it also allows that same information to be transferred between other external systems and devices.

Cupid has built-in functionality that integrates with external electrocardiogram (ECG/EKG) devices to merge specific readings or measurements with a patient’s medical record. To give you a better idea of how this works, here’s an example.

Let’s imagine Patient A has been a patient at ABC Hospital for 5 years and is required to come in once a month for a routine EKG and check-up with his cardiology team. Patient A’s physicians complete his monthly examination and send him down the hall for an EKG. The EKG practitioners connect the electrodes to Patient A’s body and begin the EKG test. Once the test is over, the results are automatically brought from the EKG machine to Patient A’s record, cutting out the need for printed results or complex movement of the results between separate systems. Epic Cupid’s integration features allow procedures like this to be completed quickly, effectively, and with reduced room for error along the wa

Epic Cupid also has pre-built connections with HL7v2 interfaces that allow users to connect order and result information from their Epic Cupid system to external systems, like Picture Archiving and Communication Systems (PACS) and other various transcription systems.

Cupid also offers optional integration support for the American College of Cardiology National Cardiovascular Data Registry (ACC-NCDR) system to provide better insights for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) or other coronary catheterization procedures.

Important Considerations for Your Epic Cupid Implementation

In the reality of most healthcare systems, their individual departments (and sometimes even different groups within the same department) are operating on separate, disconnected systems, making departmental processes segmented and unoptimized. While the Epic Cupid module does bring these groups together on a single platform to transform result documentation, test ordering, and overall process efficiency, there are a few important things to consider when beginning the implementation process:

1. Standardization: Evidence-based practices and a standardized approach help physicians and cardiac care teams learn the technology more efficiently and maintain and coordinate documentation standards throughout every cardiology group within an organization, institution, or hospital system.
2. Governance: Deciding on a plan for system leadership and choosing key leaders in each area of the technology helps reduce the risk for system variation throughout each department or group in your organization and helps recognize and fill specific hierarchal needs throughout the system.
3. Simplicity & Efficiency: Increased inefficiencies and risk for error become much more of an issue when you try to balance and navigate multiple different siloed systems. Setting up Epic Cupid’s integrations allow your entire cardiovascular information system to store and maintain important patient and procedure information in one place.
4. Simplifying Implementation: Implementing a new system like Epic Cupid can seem daunting at first, but with the right plan and the right people contributing to planning, testing, and overall implementation processes, your implementation should be a piece of cake. Installing Cupid the right way is key in the development and maintenance of the system, and with the help of consultants (like those at Surety Systems), your healthcare organization will be optimizing processes and increasing revenue in no time.

Partnering with the Best

It’s no secret that software implementations can be a little too complicated for internal teams to handle. But no need to worry – this is where our consulting services come into play.

Whether you need help implementing the entire Epic Cupid module or just need additional support with cath-structured reporting, integration with your imaging systems, or any other Epic Cupid processes, our team of senior-level Epic consultants can help you.

Surety Senior Epic Cupid Consultant

• 10 years experience as an Epic Cupid applications consultant
• Supported 10 acute care facilities on Epic Cupid
• 15 long term Epic Cupid projects under his belt
•  Performed discovery, initial planning, and documentation prior to go live
• Certified in Epic Radiant, Cupid, EpicCare Link, and Orders

Interested in learning more about Epic software as a whole? Click here to read our latest article outlining the main features, benefits, and uses of Epic.

Like what you see and want to talk to someone about how our consultants can fit your Epic Cupid needs? Contact us today.