Overview

A national behavioral healthcare organization partnered with The Latitude Group to support the standardization and optimization of electronic medical record (EMR) workflows across acute and specialty care facilities. Having grown rapidly through acquisitions, the organization operated with wide variation in documentation practices, many of which were still paper based.

With patient safety, regulatory compliance, and clinician capacity at stake, the organization needed a scalable EMR foundation that could support growth while modernizing legacy platforms without disrupting care. The organization needed an operating model that could scale across current and future facilities while reducing risk and variation introduced through growth by acquisition.

The engagement focused on designing consistent, scalable workflows that would reduce documentation burden, support staff training, and enable more time for patient care.

Designed for:

• Organizations growing through acquisition
• Teams modernizing legacy platforms

The team consisted of 30 rolling imbedded staff, with a max of 12 at one time. Typically, there would be 6 staff for discovery, 3 for facilitated Lean Six Sigma leadership, 2 for training, and 1 change manager.

Challenge

Clinical and administrative teams were navigating fragmented workflows across facilities, leading to inefficiencies, documentation gaps, and inconsistent patient experiences.

Key challenges included:

• Continued reliance on paper documentation in many facilities
• Inconsistent EMR usage and workflow design
• Limited standardization across acquired locations
• Time-intensive documentation reducing patient-facing care

Together, these challenges created operational risk, limited scalability, and clinicians pulled away from patient care at a time when demand and complexity were increasing.

Leadership needed a structured, clinician-informed approach to EMR standardization that could scale across diverse care settings. The real challenge was not implementing an EMR, but creating consistency, adoption, and governance across a rapidly expanding organization.

Approach

The Latitude Group assembled a cross-functional team of business process engineers, change management specialists, and business analysts to lead the effort from discovery through design.

What differentiated The Latitude Group was not just process design, but the ability to embed with frontline teams while operating at an enterprise governance level. Our approach was built to translate frontline realities into scalable, executive-ready solutions.

Our work included:

• Deep engagement with frontline staff, clinicians, and operational leaders
• Current-state and future-state patient journey mapping
• Development of functional and technical requirements
• Active collaboration with the EMR vendor to align platform capabilities with clinical needs
• Governance, prioritization, and change management embedded throughout

Transformation

Working in close partnership with the client and vendor, the team delivered a comprehensive EMR process foundation designed for consistency, adoption, and scale:

• Designed and documented standardized workflows across acute care settings
• Created 284 EMR flows to support consistent documentation
• Facilitated Lean Six Sigma sessions with end users to identify pain points and improvement opportunities
• Built a weighted scoring model to prioritize enhancements
• Established a centralized gap repository to support audit readiness

The number of clinicians and staff engaged in discovery and design sessions varied, depending on the complexity of flow from 4 to 14.

Results

The engagement produced durable operational assets that positioned the organization for long-term success:

• A full business process framework for standardized EMR workflows
• Reduced documentation complexity and variability
• Clear training and implementation recommendations
• Adoption and utilization metrics to measure ongoing success

Together, these outcomes gave leaders confidence that standardization could scale without sacrificing care quality or frontline adoption. These outcomes moved the organization from fragmented documentation practices to a scalable, adoption-ready EMR operating model.

Partnership

The Latitude Group embedded deeply within the client’s transformation and governance structures, participating in steering committees, vendor sessions, and frontline engagement.

Our consultants balanced technical rigor with empathy for clinical realities, allowing leaders to move quickly with confidence, knowing decisions were grounded in both operational discipline and patient-centered care.

Looking Ahead

The standardized EMR framework positions the organization to scale consistently across new and existing facilities, support clinician onboarding, and continue modernizing care delivery.

This engagement reflects how The Latitude Group partners with organizations navigating large-scale technology change, particularly those growing through acquisition or modernizing legacy platforms, balancing speed, rigor, and human-centered design to deliver lasting impact.