Dear Colleagues:

The Clinical Enterprise Strategic Plan Kick Off meeting was held earlier today.  It was wonderful being in a room full of talented, engaged, and highly motivated individuals spanning the various aspects of our clinical efforts, all of whom are committed to ensuring the implementation and success of our strategic plan.  Thank you to everyone who has agreed to serve as strategy leaders, tactic leaders, coordinators, and members of the tactic teams.  In particular, I’d like to thank Jack Feussner for his leadership on this initiative.  There is a great deal of work ahead of us, but I am confident that, together, we can achieve our vision of being “nationally recognized as a premier academic medical center”.  The website for the strategic plan will “go live” next week, and will contain more information on efforts around this important initiative.

The new Epic ambulatory electronic medical record goes live in five pilot clinics on March 22, 2012, with all other MUSC clinics and Carolina Family Care going live on May 17, 2012. On February 6, Epic will be loaded with all patient demographics and patient chart abstraction will begin.  Information regarding e-learning for the abstraction process and other Epic project updates can be found at epic.musc.edu.  As always, our CMIO, Dr. Bob Warren, is available to respond to your questions or concerns.

I learned earlier this week that our Neurophysiology Lab was recently awarded Electrodiagnostic (EDX) Laboratory Accreditation from the American Association of Neuromuscular and Electrodiagnostic Medicine.  We are the first in the state to receive this accreditation.  Special recognition should be given to Dr. David Stickler and Amanda Ledford for their efforts in attaining this milestone.  We are currently the only hospital in the nation to be a Level IV Epilepsy Center with intracranial and extracranial vascular testing accreditation, EEG accreditation, intra-operative monitoring and accreditation, and EMG accreditation.  I’d like to take this opportunity to express my appreciation to all involved.  This level of accomplishment and recognition is yet another example of how we are “changing what’s possible” in healthcare for the citizens of South Carolina.

As I shared with you last week, the Cardiovascular Working Group, which was chaired by Drs. Don Menick and Phil Saul, has now submitted its report and recommendations to me.  A copy of their full report can be found at http://www.musc.edu/com/research/CardiovascularReport.pdf.  I would appreciate hearing from members of the College of Medicine regarding the committee’s recommendations.  Those wishing to comment on the report may send their thoughts via email to research-plan@musc.edu.

As always, I look forward to hearing from you via email or when I attend your departmental meetings.

With warm regards,

Etta