Epic tells Texas AG: Our EHR systems are helping physicians treat patients across the country

The Texas Attorney General’s Office has no proof to back up claims that electronic health record (EHR) giant Epic Systems Corp. engages in anticompetitive behavior, according to the company.

Epic Systems Corp. filed its legal response to the lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. He alleged Epic has created a monopoly that freezes out both business competitors and parents who wish to keep access to and control over their children’s medical records.

The Wisconsin-based software developer called the allegations “pretextual and baseless,” and it will ask the court to dismiss the case because any claims, even if proven, don’t violate antitrust laws.

What’s more, “the petition does nothing to promote the interests of Texas patients or their health care providers,” said the legal response filed by Epic attorneys Lauren A. Moskowitz of New York and Christopher J. Schwegmann of Texas.

“Epic has achieved its success the hard way — by constantly innovating its products in response to customer requests and with an unwavering goal of helping Epic’s customers succeed in improving patient outcomes,” the legal response said.

Just the facts, please

To pick apart the lawsuit, the company’s 26-page legal answer dives into detail about EHRs, its products and their capabilities.

Texas apparently had a six-month “comprehensive civil investigation” before filing the lawsuit. That inquest “revealed nothing anticompetitive, deceptive or illicit about Epic’s conduct,” the Epic answer said.

Instead, Texas’ top law enforcement lawyer “relies heavily on dated, biased press articles and blog posts,” along with allegations in a separate private lawsuit that Epic is seeking to dismiss from court. When citing materials from Texas’ investigation, the lawsuit routinely mischaracterizes what the materials actually say, the Epic answer said.

“The failure by the state to come forward with facts or legitimate legal bases to support any of its claims, after conducting an investigation, is telling,” the company’s legal answer said. “When Epic asked the state to identify any Epic customers it claimed were not in compliance with the new law, the State did not identify a single Epic customer.”

‘Woke’ EHRs vs. parental rights?

The reality is that Texas is targeting Epic “over a politicized issue regarding proxy access that Epic does not belong in the middle of,” the company’s response said. The Texas AG’s Office confirmed as much in its press release, calling Epic a “woke corporation” that supposedly undermines parents’ rights.

“That is simply not true,” the Epic answer said. “The medical records at issue here do not belong to Epic, and any decisions about who can access them are not Epic’s to make.”

Epic’s MyChart patient app allows patients to monitor their own health data and that of their minor children. Patients use the app to communicate with physicians and other clinicians “and, as a result, help patients get well, stay well, and be healthier overall,” the legal response said.

Promoting interoperability

Nor does Epic stand as a gatekeeper blocking the exchange of patient data between health systems, according to the company. Epic is a pioneer of health care interoperability and is a founding member of Carequality, an interoperability network started in 2014 to facilitate the transfer of patient information.

More recently, Epic was the first EHR software company to sign on to the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA), the government-sponsored interoperability network developed in the 21^st Century Cures Act. As of this month, Epic said 86% of its customers are set up or signed up for TEFCA use.

That’s a lot of records

The legal response acknowledged the scope of medical information beaming around physician offices, hospitals and health systems of the United States. Epic customers exchange more than 725 million records a month, with more than half between Epic and non-Epic systems. In 2025, Epic customers executed 200 billion targeted data exchanges, such as requesting lists of patient medications or medical problems, the legal response said.

“Thus, in direct contrast to the notion in the petition that Epic somehow controls access to patient data, Epic has been and continues to be a leader in ensuring that patient data is properly accessible where Epic’s customers, as custodians of that data, deem appropriate,” the legal response said.

Free, fair market competition

Conducting business in a free market economy, Epic is not required to lend a helping hand to competitors. Even so, Epic has a library of more than 500 standards-based application programming interfaces (APIs) available free at open.epic.com. More than 1,500 different third-party applications connect to Epic customer systems using those free tools. Texas officials also know about the website — “but completely omits it from the petition, perhaps because it contradicts the narrative the state is trying to tell,” the Epic answer said.

Epic does develop private APIs and has worked with companies including Oracle Health, Microsoft and Amazon. The company charges rates based on creating and maintaining intellectual property, not just “moving electrons around,” the company’s answer said.

How much does it cost?

As for pricing, Epic says the Texas AG cannot decide whether the company’s prices are too high, leading to excessive profits, or too low, undercutting competitors.

“The state wants it both ways, but neither is accurate,” the Epic response said. “Courts are particularly wary of over-reaching allegations of predatory pricing, and the state’s allegations are cause for even greater vigilance than usual because they are based on blatantly distorted facts.”