Acquisitions Acquisitions (Details) (USD $)			6 Months Ended				6 Months Ended
	Jun. 29, 2013	Dec. 29, 2012	Jun. 29, 2013 Pure Wellness [Member]	Mar. 04, 2013 Pure Wellness [Member]	Mar. 04, 2013 Pure Wellness [Member] Customer relationships [Member]	Mar. 04, 2013 Pure Wellness [Member] Existing technologies [Member]	Jun. 29, 2013 Labotix [Member]	Mar. 18, 2013 Labotix [Member]	Mar. 04, 2013 Domestic Segment Pure Wellness [Member]	Mar. 18, 2013 Domestic Segment Labotix [Member]
Business Acquisition [Line Items]
Current assets				$ 1,427,000
Property and equipment				240,000
Current liabilities				(1,315,000)
Total net tangible assets				352,000
Intangible assets				20,269,000	10,464,000	9,805,000		5,200,000
Acquired Finite-lived Intangible Assets, Weighted Average Useful Life			7 years				5 years
Goodwill	306,951,000	247,616,000							48,496,000	11,700,000
Business Combination, Recognized Identifiable Assets Acquired, Goodwill, and Liabilities Assumed, Net				69,117,000
Business Combination, Goodwill Recognized, Description			consists largely of the synergies and economies of scale, including the value of the assembled workforce, expected from combining the operations of Cerner and PureWellness
Business Acquisition, Goodwill, Expected Tax Deductible Amount				48,496,000				0
Business Acquisition, Effective Date of Acquisition			Mar. 04, 2013				Mar. 18, 2013
Business Acquisition, Name of Acquired Entity			Kaufman & Keen, LLC (doing business as PureWellness)				Labotix Corporation (together with its wholly owned subsidiary Labotix Automation, Inc., Labotix)
Business Acquisition, Percentage of Voting Interests Acquired								100.00%
Business Acquisition, Description of Acquired Entity			a health and wellness company that develops solutions for the administration and management of wellness programs, and to enable plan member engagement strategies.				Labotix is a developer of laboratory automation solutions for clinical laboratories.
Business Combination, Reason for Business Combination			Our acquisition of PureWellness will further expand what we believe to be a robust offering of solutions to manage and improve the health of populations.				We believe the combination of Cerner Millennium, Cerner Copath, and Labotix allows us to offer a comprehensive set of capabilities to support high volume laboratory testing.
Business Combination, Consideration Transferred			69,100,000				18,000,000
Business Combination, Contingent Consideration, Liability				$ 19,000,000
Business Combination, Contingent Consideration Arrangements, Description			payable if we achieve certain revenue milestones from PureWellness solutions and services during the period commencing on August 1, 2013 and ending April 30, 2015
Business Combination, Provisional Information, Initial Accounting Incomplete, Reasons			The allocation of purchase price is subject to changes as an appraisal of intangible assets is finalized and additional information becomes available; however, we do not expect material changes.				The allocation of purchase price is subject to changes as a working capital adjustment is finalized and additional information becomes available; however, we do not expect material changes.