Bronson Healthcare System Achieves Epic Gold Stars Level 10

Bronson Healthcare is proud to announce it has achieved Epic Gold Stars Level 10 for 2024! This is the highest level of recognition that Epic awards for outstanding use of their electronic health record (EHR) system. Achieving Gold Stars Level 10 places Bronson in the top 9% of Epic users nationally and reflects the health system’s commitment to leveraging technology to support its vision of exceptional healthcare made easier for every person.

To accomplish Gold Stars Level 10, Bronson successfully adopted over 95% of 700+ features recommended by Epic. By implementing Epic’s newest, most complete set of tools, Bronson providers and caregivers can manage patient information more easily, enhance quality of care with advanced tools to guide them, and improve patients’ overall care experience.

The Epic Gold Stars program is a 10-level program designed to encourage continuous improvement in EHR usability and feature adoption. It measures patient access, patient experience, clinical quality and safety, population health management, physician productivity, nursing productivity, and more. Bronson has achieved Levels 9 or 10 for each of the last four years.

Meghan Cole, Bronson VP, Applications and Digital Officer, says, “Gold Stars Level 10 means that Bronson is a national leader in effectively using our EHR to improve clinician workflows, patient care outcomes and business functions. Our Information Technology team partners with staff and providers across our system and in the community to ensure we are always learning, optimizing, and improving our technology and digital tools to better serve our patients.”

What does this mean for patients?

In addition to the above, Bronson’s commitment to excellence in optimizing the Epic EHR is also evident in the patient portal – Bronson MyChart. MyChart is used by patients to access doctors’ records, schedule appointments, review and re-fill medications, pay bills, message their care team, and more. It is used by over 150 million patients across the US. Many of the latest features in Bronson MyChart align with usability enhancements that are part of the Gold Stars program. Some features that support Gold Stars Level 10 for improving the patient experience include:

• Providing patients with real time test results including links to their imaging results and reports.
• Epic’s Hello World tool gives patients an easy and secure way to text to pay any balances with a few clicks and saved payment method on file.
• On Demand Video Visits to get care when and where needed can be accessed whether the user is an existing Bronson patient or not.

The Epic Gold Stars program rewards progress and highlights best practices in the industry. It takes tremendous collaboration, innovation and investment of time and resources for health systems to adopt new technology and educate users year over year.

“This recognition is a testament to the talent, value and impact of Bronson’s IT professionals,” says Dr. Ash Goel, Bronson Sr. VP and Chief Information Officer. “Bronson’s IT team shines in their commitment to not only attain Epic Gold Stars Level 10, but to optimize the efficiency and effectiveness of hundreds of software and digital resources that patients, providers and teams at Bronson rely on every day. We are extremely proud of their accomplishments.”

Bronson Healthcare is currently hiring for a variety of positions in Calhoun, Kalamazoo and Van Buren counties. To learn more or apply, visit bronsonhealth.com/careers.