A Constellation of Tools Supporting the Clinical Trials Process
Research IT supports the key tools that drive the clinical trials process at the University of Washington: Epic, OnCore and Vestigo. We work directly with clinicians, researchers, and study teams to help facilitate exceptional patient care, great outcomes, and useful research.
Clinical Trials Management System (CTMS)
In 2018 UW Medicine, Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center (FH) and Seattle Cancer Center Alliance (SCCA) jointly launched a Clinical Trials Management System, using Advarra OnCore and Advarra EDC to facilitate the needs of Oncology studies, and as of 2020, is also supporting non-Oncology studies.
Questions about the CTMS or Advarra EDC should be directed at the CTMS Program Office Helpdesk:
Epic Research Module
Epic is the primary Electronic Health Records (EHR) system for UW Medicine and ITHS and Research IT is responsible for the Epic Research Module.
Researchers looking to get access, build augmentations or just discover new features that exist or can be created are encouraged to engage with our team. We have the direct hands on knowledge and experience to help find your solution.
Questions about the Epic Research Module should be directed at the Research IT Helpdesk:
Vestigo
Vestigo is a helper app for Investigational Drug Service pharmacies providing for inventory management, compliance monitoring and reporting, and real-time integration with the OnCore API.
Questions about Vestigo and the Vestigo-OnCore integration should be directed at the CTMS Program Office Helpdesk:
Sometimes your study needs a close integration with medical systems for safety, optimization and impact.
Epic Research Services We Offer
Research IT provides consulting on building custom functionality for enterprise and study specific tools within the Epic Research Module.
Enterprise Support Includes:
- Research study and patient enrollment record interface design
- Patient preferences and research related ordering tools (CPOE) implementation
- Recruitment reports and inquiries
- Research study billing and billing calendar protocol design and troubleshooting
Study Specific Support Includes:
- Study Recruitment BPAs (Best Practice Advisories)
- Reporting Workbench (RWB) recruitment reports
- Patient Registries
- Contraindicated Medication Alerts
- Adverse Event Notifications
- Study-related InBasket Notifications (Grand Central and/or Cadence event notifications)
- Research Result InBasket Messages
Our team can help you get the most of our research systems
Training
We offer training solutions for the key research tools we support.
- Epic Research Fundamentals (T3 CRPC Arbridged)
- Epic Research Fundamentals (The Basics of Epic Research Workflows)
- Epic Retrospective Chart Review and ED Trackboard
- External Research Monitor Process Overview
- Epic Research New Functionality Review
- OnCore 100 – Overview
- OnCore 200 – Protocols
- OnCore 300 – IRB Reviews
- OnCore 400 – Calendars
- OnCore 410 – Billing Grid and Budget
- OnCore 500 – Subjects and Visits
- OnCore 510 – Sponsor Invoicing
- OnCore 520 – Vendor Payables
Rates
The UW has Internal and External billing rates based on the Institution supported and their organizations status and funding source of the project.
Internal UW Rate
With UW Worktags
$150
External Rate
No UW Budget Number
$200
Industry Rate
Internal With Industry
$270
We invoice in the first week of the month for work done in the previous month. This amount will be automatically deducted from the supplied budget number. The billing contact you supply before beginning a consultation will get an invoice (from UW Central Billing) at that time, but generally doesn't have to do a thing.
Examples of our Work
We help researchers every day do great work, here are some examples of what we have accomplished and what we can do together.
EpicCare Link
EpicCare Link allows study teams to grant research study monitors time-controlled secure remote access to the UW Medicine EHR in order to review relevant medical records for participants enrolled on their research studies. This eliminates unnecessary travel previously needed for onsite review and limits study monitor’s visibility to only study participant records that have been released to them by a UW Medicine team member. Since our implementation of EpicCare Link in 2021, UW RIT has received and processed more than 7000 monitor access requests.
OnCore-Epic Integrations
To streamline research operational processes and keep study and billing grid records aligned between systems, UW Medicine Research implemented both the RPE and CRPC interfaces between OnCore and Epic. Our Research IT department, in collaboration with the CTMS, Bridges, and Data Integration teams continue ongoing work to refine, enhance, and grow the interface capabilities between Epic and OnCore leveraging custom API’s in addition to the standard interface variables.
eMerge
UW Medicine is one of 10 academic medical centers participating in the eMERGE research network. eMERGE has targeted 11 common conditions for which they will collect, store, and provide sites with the genetic risk scores, family health history, and personal health history of site participants enrolled in the study. Epic Research in collaboration with a network of UW Medicine Provider, Epic Ambulatory, and Data Integration teams are working together to facilitate the automated ingestion of the polygenic and monogenic risk scores, and care recommendations, into Epic. Providers will leverage the returned risk scores and treatment recommendations to consult with participating patients on how to improve their healthcare outcomes.
OnCore Document Search
Initially when CTMS program office requested a web application to manage documents and videos, it was meant for program office personnel to manage documents and videos (update, add, delete) and for all OnCore users to view them. Later on, when more and more documents were added in the portal, sometimes it is cumbersome for end users to find what documents they need to refer to. So program office asked whether a elastic search function can be added on top of it. We implemented the search function and the end user were very pleased about it.