One of our clients in California was the first healthcare organization in the country to move all of its 22,000 users to an Electronic Health Record (EHR) program in just one launch day.

Successful EHR adoption is quite possibly the greatest — and potentially the costliest — challenge to a modern healthcare organization. When done right, the move to electronic records benefits patient and physician alike; when done wrong, it is a nightmare that can be confusing for healthcare professionals, and one that can compromise the accuracy and security of patient records. In the U.S., there is the potential for millions of dollars in fines if patient records are breached, or even just vulnerable. There is also a federal push for full EHR adoption by 2015, and significant financial impacts to providers that miss that deadline.

This large healthcare organization was under tight timelines and financial constraints. Rather than incur the costs and process inconsistencies of a lengthy, staggered rollout, the decision was made to migrate all 22,000 users to full EHR adoption in one launch. Project leaders of this $350 million undertaking knew that users needed a robust support line; however, forecasting the level of support was difficult. There was no precedent — or existing support center — and the “unknowns” made a long-term contract inadvisable. We created an agile, holistic contact center solution that would not only cater to the needs of users adopting new technology, but also one that could control costs and scale down rapidly, in the event that the client’s high contact forecast was short-lived. The client also could not afford to staff the center for months before launch.

We had 500 associates hired and trained in two weeks for the launch, which was dialed back to 75 within two weeks due to the success of the launch, and also the adaptability of the workforce solution. Today, the contact center continues smoothly with less than 10 associates active at a time — retaining the high customer satisfaction the client prides itself on, while still providing round-the-clock support to healthcare providers.