Teach EPIC at college or seek hopital trainer position

Dreamer-RN · Oct 30, 2010

Grr1016,

Cannot offer much insight to Epic training. However, my employer sent me to training for their EMR system. I think with trying to break into the Informatics field and having absolutely no EHR/EMR implementation experience, you'll need to seek employers who are willing to train you on their system (whether the training is done internally or externally at the vendor). As mentioned in your post, another approach you can take is trying to work for a vendor (Epic, McKesson, Siemens, Meditech, Cerner, etc.).

Overall, you can encounter the same problem again if you change employers to one who uses a different EHR/EMR system than the one you were trained on. However, the difference for this scenario is you'll have experience with implementing at least one system.

rninformatics, DNP, RN · Nov 1, 2010

I apologize if I miss read your post..... but I am not sure how you would be teaching Epic at a college if you yourself have not been trained on it?? I was also not aware that Epic (like Cerner) provides test data bases of its software to collegues.

Are we talking about the same "Epic" the HIS software vendor located in Wisc??? The one that requires all its employees live in Wisc, that "Epic"?

Additionally see the links I've provided below about the subject of Epic training. There is a great deal more here in the NI section of allnurses.com and I encourage you to search this forum for more details.

Good Luck!

Anyone Certified As An Epic Analyst? - Page 5- Nursing for Nurses

Hi all,
I am 41, have 11 years nursing experience. I have not done any nursing for 6 years. I now have a small computer repair business. I am CompTia A+ certified computer technician. I want to break into the informatics field. I will be finishing my Master's Degree in Health Care Administration/ Informatics in July 2011. A local hospital is starting to roll out EPIC upgrade very soon. In talking to the hospital IT recruiter yesterday he stated that they are set on trainers at the moment. They have already sent a handful of nurse to get Epic training last Spring and that getting a chance to get Epic trained "is like getting hit by lightning." I think he may think that I may be overqualified to be a trainer. He said that I should contact vendors like McKesson, EPIC, and Cerner directly. When I talked to EPIC they say that you need to get trained at a facility that is implementing the software. Confusing. Anyone have any personal experience? Is there a good way to break in? The recruiter also made it seem like they wanted people already working at the hospital. I would wager that I am more qualified than 90% of them.
I have another opportunity at a local nursing college to teach nursing students EPIC. They are "very interested" although the course program is not build yet, several months out. I was told that there was 6 weeks of intense training involved. Does anyone know what this training could be? I am thinking training like a "superuser." EPIC has all kinds of certifications of course. Anyone made the jump from a superuser to other certs? Any other insight would be appreciated!

Grr1016 · Nov 2, 2010

Hello,

Thanks for the responses! Yes, I am told that it for the actual EPIC software. The college and hospital that is rolling out EPIC have a strong relationship. That is the only reason I think they will be teaching it at the college. Like I said , they would train me first. I had not heard of it being taught at the colleges either. If you are interested in how it works out I will let you know. Any idea the training I would get? I know it's 6 weeks (I was told) long. I don't think the main gal knows more than what she told me because it's all new to them and still in the planning stages.

Thanks!