Messages from the Vice Chairs of Safety, Quality, & Operations

Updates from the Vice Chair of Inpatient Safety, Quality & Operations

• The Plaza West Tower is open, the cardiology services completed their moves the week of October 27, 2025. The CCU is now located in 7100; and general cardiology (including Cardiology/Medicine Firm, CREU, hospitalists services, and heart failure services) are on floors 11100-14100.
• The supplemental billing attestation (general smartphrase .hosres) was updated in September, offering additional options in element 1, additional guidance in element 2, and streamlining of choices for element 3.

Updates from the Vice Chair of Ambulatory Clinical Operations, Safety & Quality

• A new workflow that checks insurance coverage for hospitalized patients who will be discharged to be seen in follow up at a Wash U clinic is now available for ID, Rheumatology, Endocrine and Nephrology. Cardiology and GI will be going live soon.  When appropriate, inpatient attendings or consulting providers should enter an ambulatory referral to these WashU DOM ambulatory clinics through the Discharge Navigator or Future Outpatient orders. These orders will route to the business office to verify coverage, then the team will enter an encounter note regarding contracted or non-contracted coverage. The encounter note can be found in Chart Review. This should help prevent last minute surprises for non-contracted patients and allow for appropriate discharge planning for follow up care.
• eConsults are available for Allergy/Immunology and Dermatology and are to be use for provider-to-provider questions/consultations — similar to a curb-side consult. These do not involve talking to or examining the patient. Order these by typing in “Consult Allergy” or “Consult Dermatology” in Epic. If you wish to refer your patient to be seen by one of these specialties, use the order “Refer” instead to create a referral for the patient to get scheduled. eConsult build is underway for Rheumatology, Nephrology, Hematology and Endocrine and will be going live later this year.
• An Epic Coordinating Committee with a representative from each division of the DOM is being formed to filter and prioritize Epic ticket requests arising from each of our divisions. This committee will have close contact with Epic builders and should result in faster turn around and greater transparency, allowing Epic to work better for all of us.