Data Sources for eDiscovery Professionals
Epic Systems
Company Snapshot
Epic Systems Corporation is a privately‑held electronic health record (EHR) vendor headquartered in Verona, Wisconsin. Epic software is deployed at ≈ 39 % of U.S. acute‑care hospitals—the largest market share of any EHR—and stores medical records for an estimated 260 million patients.
Origin
Epic was founded in 1979 by computer programmer Judith “Judy” Faulkner in the basement of a Madison apartment using a $6,000 CDC 6600 mini‑computer loan. The company—originally named Human Services Computing—released its first patient‑database product in 1983 and has remained founder‑led and employee‑owned, emphasizing long‑term R&D over quarterly results.
The Epic Platform
Epic’s architecture centers on two proprietary data stores:
- Chronicles – a hierarchical, InterSystems Caché‑based operational database optimized for real‑time clinical workflows.
- Clarity & Caboodle – SQL Server– or Oracle‑based analytic warehouses populated nightly for large‑scale reporting.
Modern interoperability relies on FHIR R4 / Bulk FHIR APIs, HL7 v2, and C‑CDA documents, while the Care Everywhere network facilitates cross‑organization record exchange.
Extracting Epic Data for Investigation
| Method | What you get | Typical Volume | Pro Tips |
| Clarity DW Queries (SQL) | Daily snapshots of most Chronicles tables | High (TB‑scale) | Filter by contact_date, pat_id; join to CLARITY_SER for provider attribution. |
| Caboodle / Cogito Data Warehouse | Curated, de‑normalized views with Slicer‑Dicer lineage | High | Good for cohorts; preserve ETL run date. |
| Report Workbench / Radar Exports | User‑generated CSV, XLSX, or PDF reports | Low‑Medium | Capture template ID & run parameters for reproducibility. |
| Bulk FHIR Export (/$export) | NDJSON files per resource type (Patient, Encounter, Observation…) | Variable | Requires Epic admin enablement; include $since cursor for incremental pulls. |
| C‑CDA Continuity of Care Docs | XML documents for each encounter or patient summary | Low | Validate against XSD; hash embedded binaries (labs, imaging). |
| Chronicles Read APIs / Chronicles Direct | Real‑time reads from operational DB | Low | Use sparingly; impairs production performance—schedule during off‑peak hours. |
| Care Everywhere Query Log | Audit of outbound/inbound HIE requests | Low | Useful for tracing record‑sharing events in breach investigations. |
Preservation Tip: Chronicles retains full version history for most clinical objects; however, some flowsheet rows and audit tables may be purged based on retention settings (< 18 months default). Issue a legal hold and request Chronicles Journal Archives or copy to a sandbox environment.
Common eDiscovery & Investigation Use Cases
- Medical malpractice litigation – Produce full encounter histories, clinician notes, and audit trails to reconstruct the standard of care timeline.
- False Claims & Stark Law audits – Correlate professional billing (Resolute Professional) with clinical documentation (progress notes, orders).
- Data‑breach response & HIPAA violations – Analyze Care Everywhere logs and access audits for unauthorized lookups.
- Employment disputes (clinical staff) – Retrieve secure chats (Epic Chat/Buzz) and in‑basket messages between providers.
- M&A diligence / hospital affiliation – Validate quality metrics, patient demographics, and revenue cycle KPIs via Clarity extracts.
Related Epic‑Owned Technologies & Modules
- MyChart – Patient portal & mobile app
- Care Everywhere – Nationwide health‑information exchange
- Haiku / Canto – Mobile EHR for iPhone / iPad
- Caboodle – Enterprise data warehouse
- Cogito Analytics – Self‑service BI & Slicer‑Dicer
- Lucy – Portable patient record (USB/file)
- Epic Bot / Buzz – Secure clinician messaging
- Tapestry – Managed‑care & claims admin
- LifeCycle – Long‑term data retention archive