How a modern, integrated CDM drives revenue recognition, clinical alignment, and scalable growth in Epic environments

If implementing your Epic EHR didn’t significantly reshape your chargemaster, you’re doing it wrong. 

Old CDMs were large, clumsy, and static—siloed spreadsheets managed by a handful of experts. Modern CDMs are multidimensional and deconstructed, built across multiple master files and tools like Epic’s EAPs, FSCs, BCCs, DEPs, and charge router. When properly leveraged, these interconnected components enable automation, scalability, and truly intelligent revenue cycle performance. 

The chargemaster isn’t just a billing artifact. It’s the backbone of robust revenue recognition—driving financial accuracy, regulatory compliance, operational consistency, and clinician clarity and satisfaction, across the enterprise. 

A modern CDM must balance simplicity and complexity: simple enough to maintain, yet complex enough to capture the nuance of today’s healthcare delivery. When built right, it supports: 

• Ease of maintenance – streamlined updates, clean deactivations, rapid pricing changes. 

• Bi-directional integration with the EHR – because if your CDM doesn’t exist in the clinical modules, then for all intents and purposes, it doesn’t exist. Deleted charges need to be removed from clinical modules and new ones put in.  

• Clarified coding workflows – clean handoffs between HIM and CDM, minimizing ambiguity, rework, and timely workqueue management. 

• Full potential reimbursement – compliant charges that improves your clean claims rate and reduces line-item denials from commercial payers. 

• Clinical integration – when charges trigger in clinical modules, it’s a beautiful thing, though often this does not happen.  

• Clinician workflow efficiency and satisfaction – shared system build is critical for consistent workflows, provider satisfaction, and accurate downstream charging. 

• Efficient claims creation – fewer edits, faster A/R, better compliance. 

• Defensible pricing strategies – enabling CDM leadership to move quickly while staying transparent and compliant. 

• Meaningful, structured data – supporting patient estimates, decision support teams, and compliance with price transparency requirements. 

At The Wilshire Group, we supported a major academic medical center in building a streamlined, dynamic Epic CDM—managing over $25 billion in annual charges with fewer than 6,000 active charges (EAPs). This infrastructure enabled seamless integration of new affiliates over many years without disrupting revenue cycle or clinical operations. 

The chargemaster is no longer just a technical asset—it’s a strategic one. 

Is yours keeping up? Let’s talk. Contact Wilshire to learn more.