Scripps Community Connect
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Do you have a question about Scripps Community Connect or other ACO-related items? Contact the Scripps ACO operations team.
About Scripps Community Connect
About Scripps Community Connect
Joining the Scripps ACO shows you appreciate collaboration. You value being part of a forward-thinking, high-performing network of providers and facilities. But you’re not truly and fully integrated unless you’re also part of our shared electronic health record (EHR). Scripps is making its EHR available to eligible ACO network providers through a program called Scripps Community Connect.
Prospective Community Connect users
If you are interested in learning more about Scripps Community Connect, review the answers below to frequently asked questions.
What is Scripps Community Connect?
Scripps Health recently implemented Epic, a leading EHR platform, across its entire system. Epic is certified and HIPAA-compliant. And it’s helped make patient care at Scripps safer and more efficient than ever before.
Scripps can extend its Epic license to affiliated physicians who share patients with our ACO. We’ve named this offering Scripps Community Connect.
Participating providers receive Epic’s broad EHR and practice management capabilities, allowing you to achieve full integration among your office, Scripps hospitals and our other physician partners throughout the region. Such integration helps us enhance care and improve outcomes for our mutual patients, while keeping your practice billing information separate.
Even better, we’ll help you pay for it. The Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) waiver allows Scripps to significantly subsidize Epic for ACO network providers who meet certain eligibility requirements. This subsidy includes software, services, hardware, installation and support.
What are the physician benefits?
Scripps Community Connect offers advantages far beyond eliminating paper records. Clinical and financial benefits for your practice may include:
- Immediate access to relevant clinical information — staff no longer spend time pulling charts or looking for misplaced records
- Streamlined monitoring and reporting of quality, cost and patient satisfaction data
- Shared clinical data, including a single problem list, medication list and allergy list — this improves care coordination, especially during transitions of care
- Consistent clinical practices, including common workflows and order sets
- E-prescribing functionality, which helps reduce medication errors
- Decision support tools
- Chronic disease management with health deterioration alerts
- Real-time access to patient encounters across the Scripps integrated network, including ER visits and hospital admissions
- Faster and more accurate insurance verification
- Reduced transcription costs
- "Partitioned” financial data, meaning access to pricing contracts, fee schedules, claims and other business information is restricted to your individual office
What are the patient benefits?
Our Scripps Community Connect offering includes the MyScripps patient portal. This secure tool gives your patients convenient online and mobile access to their electronic health records. It lets them manage aspects of their own care on their own time, including:
- Scheduling or canceling appointments
- Viewing lab or imaging results
- Requesting prescription refills
- Emailing their doctor’s office
- Checking-in for appointments, including answering visit questionnaires ahead of time
What’s included in the Scripps Community Connect package?
Our comprehensive EHR package for Scripps ACO network providers includes:
Integrated tools
- Ambulatory EHR
- Applications for patient registration and scheduling
- Point-of-care scanning
- E-prescribing
- Lab and imaging interfaces
- MyScripps patient portal
- Dragon voice-recognition dictation
- Epic Professional Billing module (optional)
Infrastructure
- Epic server and storage
- Network components, including cabling and circuits
- Hardware, including printers, scanners and exam room devices
Specialized training
- On-site practice assessment and readiness
- Personalization based on your specialty and the needs of your practice
- Online learning modules
- In-person training for specific job functions and super users
- Clinical and technical dress rehearsals
Ongoing support
- Two weeks of on-site support following go-live
- Experienced staff who manage future software upgrades for you
- Premier support services available 24/7/365
In addition to the Community Connect scope outlined above, Scripps ACO is committed to ensuring thorough review and internal analysis of any out-of-scope requests that practices may additionally wish to have quoted. Scripps has produced a competitively priced “a la carte” menu and will work closely with your practice to provide education around this internal review, expectations, and associated costs to the practice for additional options.
We acknowledge that it takes time and effort to get an EHR up-and-running. But it’s far less challenging when you have an experienced team supporting you through implementation and beyond. We’ll assess your readiness, build and test the platform, and help with training and go-live — all with minimal disruption to your clinical practice.
What are the requirements for joining Scripps Community Connect?
We value our partnership with you. That’s why we’re willing to make significant investments to bring our ACO network providers on board with Epic.
The physician-led Scripps ACO Board will review and prioritize requests for Scripps Community Connect. At a minimum, physicians must meet two key requirements:
- You must be a participant in the Scripps ACO. Federal law allows Scripps to pay a significant subsidy for you to implement an EHR, but only if you are a participating provider in the Medicare Shared Savings Program through the Scripps ACO, or another qualifying Scripps ACO product.
- You must meet certain performance requirements. The Scripps ACO Board has established performance standards for participating providers. These standards help ensure the Scripps ACO meets the annual cost and quality metrics required by the MSSP and other purchasers contracted with the ACO. They also ensure that physicians who take advantage of our subsidized offering use the EHR to its full capabilities.
Physician performance requirements include, but are not limited to:
- Agreeing to fully use the EHR at all times, when clinically appropriate
- Accepting workflows and disease-specific clinical content as implemented by Scripps
- Using Scripps computerized physician order entry (CPOE) when ordering services at our hospitals
- Using open-access scheduling
- Agreeing to report data — data sharing is critical to ensuring we’re in compliance with required quality, cost and patient satisfaction metrics
How do I schedule a pre-assessment?
See for yourself why so many Scripps ACO providers have already chosen Scripps Community Connect.
Our practice outreach managers can schedule a pre-assessment to introduce you to Scripps Community Connect and provide more information about subsidies and implementation. A complimentary cost analysis can also be scheduled to help your practice better understand Scripps Community Connect costs in relation to costs for your current EHR.
Please contact the Scripps ACO operations team at scrippsaco@scrippshealth.org.
Existing Community Connect users
If you are an existing user of Scripps Community Connect, learn more about the documents referenced in the Software Access Agreement.
What is the end user agreement?
The End User Agreement (PDF, 280 KB) describes terms and conditions for Epic end-users for appropriate system access, use and liability. All users must acknowledge and accept terms on this agreement in order to obtain system access.
When are additional license terms applicable for replacement software?
Additional License Terms for Replacement Software (PDF, 110 KB) apply to any changes in software that may occur during the term of the Software Access Agreement. Any replacement software, including but not limited to any mandatory or recommended upgrades and updates, shall be deemed to be part of the Software.
Where can I find the most current version of the additional terms?
The most Current Version of the Additional Terms (PDF, 210 KB) includes the license terms and conditions that apply to one or more item(s) of Software or the Service(s) being provided as a part of Scripps Community Connect offering.
What are value added services?
Value Added Services (PDF, 150 KB) contains is a list of services identified and described as related to the Scripps Community Connect EHR System at practice facilites. These services are provided at the time of implementation and/or post go-live support.
What are the EHR practices and procedures?
The EHR Practices and Procedures (PDF, 310 KB) provide guidelines that help communicate expectations and ensure compliance with federal and state laws and regulations, licensure requirements and accreditation standards for Scripps Community Connect users and practices.
What do the service level objectives entail?
Service Level Objectives (PDF, 180 KB) are part of the Service Level Agreement that documents the key performance indicators and expected turnaround time for problem resolution.
Where can I find the user access and account reconfirmation policy?
The Information Systems, Non-Employee Access Policy (PDF, 720 KB) defines the process to administer non-employee access and includes requirements, roles and responsibilities. For Scripps Community Connect users, please refer to Attachment A, Reference #7.
Where can I find updates to existing Business Associates Agreement (BAA)?
The Protected Health Information and Related Reporting Requirements (PDF, 140 KB) policy contains updates to existing Business Associates Agreement (signed prior to August 2020) for Scripps Community Connect practices.