Santeware’s Optimal Cerner Registration Systems Configuration Can Reduces Patient Record Duplication!

About Shore Memorial

A large 296 bed, not-for-profit Acute Care community hospital in Somers Point, NJ. A healthcare facility that prides itself in offering centres of excellence in cancer, cardiovascular, neurologic, orthopaedic, emergency, maternity and paediatric care, The hospital is one of a select few hospitals in the U.S. to receive the Gold Seal of Approval™ for healthcare quality by The Joint Commission for its lumbar and cervical spine surgery programs.

Challenge

One of the biggest MPI (Master Patient Index) issues the hospital was facing was of the “unknown.” To broaden their enterprise suite of Cerner solutions, the facility had migrated off of a legacy registration system to a new Cerner Patient Access application. Cerner PA suite of applications is known for tracking person’s movement across an integrated or disparate health system through the encounter that it creates and the MPI being its basis. However, at that time, HIM Director and his staff were not confident with the integrity of data stored in the new MPI. They suspected that the conversion and the newly implemented registration system may have generated duplicate patient records.

Project Scope & Key Objectives

Our engagement at Santeware Healthcare focused on analyzing the hospital’s existing Cerner Millennium Patient Access and Master Patient Index environment to identify potential duplicate patient records and determine the underlying system and registration factors contributing to duplicate creation.

The primary objectives of the engagement included:

• • • Identifying potential duplicate patient records within the existing MPI
    • Analyzing patient data that had been converted from the legacy registration system
    • Evaluating Cerner registration configuration and associated system settings
    • Determining whether configuration rules were contributing to the creation of new duplicate records
    • Validating the integrity and consistency of converted patient information
    • Supporting the reconciliation of identified duplicate patient records
    • Establishing improved registration practices to reduce the creation of future duplicates
    • Providing HIM and IT teams with knowledge required to better manage the Cerner Person-Centric Data Model

Key Areas of Analysis

Santeware’s analysis covered both the existing patient data and the operational configuration of the newly implemented Cerner environment.

The assessment included:

• • • Review of existing MPI patient records
    • Analysis of potential duplicate patient pairs
    • Examination of legacy-to-Cerner converted patient information
    • Review of registration-related configuration settings
    • Analysis of the rules and settings influencing patient record creation
    • Validation of patient information and associated data relationships
    • Identification of configuration conditions that could contribute to future duplicates
    • Review of registration and HIM processes associated with patient identification and reconciliation

Solution

Santeware Healthcare Solutions was brought on to conduct a data analysis of hospitals existing MPI to identify those duplicates that needed to be reconciled, which also proved useful in evaluating the system configuration settings. While HIM staff worked closely to examine many of the initial settings, Santeware was engaged to validate that Cerner settings were correct and optimal along with validity of existing data that were extracted from the legacy system.

There are some core solution components:

1. MPI Data Analysis & Duplicate Identification

Santeware performed a detailed analysis of the hospital’s Master Patient Index to identify potential duplicate patient records. The analysis provided the hospital with a structured view of duplicate patient pairs requiring further review and reconciliation.

2. Legacy Data Conversion Validation

The project included validation of patient information that had been extracted from the legacy registration environment and converted into the Cerner environment. This helped distinguish issues associated with historical data conversion from issues being generated by the newly implemented registration system.

3. Cerner Registration Configuration Assessment

Santeware examined the existing Cerner registration configuration and associated settings to determine whether system behavior could contribute to the creation of duplicate person records.

The assessment focused on identifying configuration settings that could be optimized to improve patient identification and reduce the likelihood of duplicate record creation.

4. Duplicate Reconciliation Support

Potential duplicate patient pairs identified through the analysis were reviewed and reconciled as part of the remediation effort. This helped the hospital address existing data integrity concerns before they could create additional downstream challenges.

5. Registration Process & Rule Optimization

Based on the findings, Santeware provided recommendations for improving registration rules and associated operational processes. These recommendations enabled the hospital team to make appropriate configuration adjustments and incorporate improved processes for the Registration and HIM departments.

6. Knowledge Transfer & Operational Enablement

At the conclusion of the engagement, Santeware conducted a knowledge-transfer session covering the findings, recommendations, Cerner Millennium environment, and Person-Centric Data Model.

The knowledge transfer helped the HIM and IT teams understand how patient records are created and managed within Cerner and how appropriate system settings and operational practices can support ongoing MPI data integrity.

Result

A relatively significant number of potential duplicate pairs were identified during the data analysis after data was extracted from legacy. The duplicates issue had to be resolved immediately, before the issues compromised the integrity of the new system. An additional value provided by Santeware was its ability to closely study the existing configuration settings that resulted in generating additional duplicates and thereby suggested necessary changes which would prevent the duplicates being created in future. Hospital team accepted the suggestions and recommendations which enabled them to adjust the settings, incorporate new process for Registration and HIM department based on these system setting and is correcting the identified duplicates. This effort also supports the facility in its ongoing participation in a Regional Health Information Organization (RHIO).

“We were concerned about how patient data would convert as it moved over to Cerner,” indicates HIM Director. Subsequently, they were aware that the problem had extended beyond data conversion. In fact, post implementation, new duplicate records were being generated because of the system’s initial settings.

The Cerner Millennium system includes many data tables and nuances associated with different settings and associated rules making system set-up an involved initiative. Such was the case when Santeware began its data analysis and extraction project.

Santeware reconciled the duplicates as well as maintaining registration rules to prevent new duplicates.

When the project concluded, Santeware conducted a “knowledge transfer” of its findings and recommendations, and gave the HIM and IT groups and overview of Cerner’s Person-Centric Data Model. This included a detailed discussion regarding the Cerner Millennium system and how to best manage the creation of person records. “Not having gone through this effort would have made our involvement in our RHIO more challenging,” suggested HIM director “we are in a stronger position to support our RHIO’s health information requests.”

Business Impact

By addressing both existing duplicate records and the configuration conditions that could generate future duplicates, Santeware helped the hospital move from a reactive duplicate-reconciliation approach toward a more preventive patient identity management process.

The engagement strengthened the hospital’s ability to maintain a reliable MPI, supported more effective management of patient records within Cerner, and provided HIM and IT teams with greater confidence in managing patient information and registration processes.

support health information requests associated with its participation in a Regional Health Information Organization (RHIO).

Why Santeware

Santeware brought together healthcare data analysis, MPI expertise, Cerner system knowledge, data reconciliation, and healthcare process understanding to address the hospital’s patient identity challenges.

Rather than focusing only on identifying duplicate records, Santeware evaluated the broader relationship between converted data, Cerner configuration settings, registration processes, and ongoing MPI management.

This combination of data analysis, configuration assessment, remediation, and knowledge transfer enabled the hospital to address immediate duplicate-record concerns while establishing a stronger foundation for maintaining patient data integrity in the future.