Booking Patients in for Appointments

Purpose

There are numerous ways patients can be booked in for an appointment in Medicus. This user guide will take you through each of the different ways you can book patient appointments.

Ways to book patients in for appointments in Medicus

Patient appointments can be booked in Medicus:

1. From the 'Appointment Book' tab from the homepage
2. From a patient's care record
3. From a consultation
4. From a book appointment task

Booking an on the day appointment from the appointment book

To book an appointment from the Appointment Book, either from the homepage or the scheduling module, select 'Book appointment' from the appointment diary you would like to book a patient into.

If you are booking into an untimed diary there will be a 'Book untimed appointment' button:

If you are booking into a timed diary, you'll need to select a specific time slot that you would like to book the patient into:

This will then open up the Patient Finder. Once you've selected the patient you'll be taken to the 'Book Appointment' form.

Booking a future appointment from the Appointment Book

If you are booking a future appointment from the appointment book then select 'find appointment' to open up the free appointment finder.

Booking an appointment from the Care Record

To book a patient appointment from the Care Record, select the 'Actions' dropdown menu from the top right hand corner. Select 'Appointment' to proceed.

This will open up two options:

1. View appointment book - selecting this option will open up the Appointment Book where you can view appointment diaries with available appointments to book the patient into.
2. Free appointment finder - selecting this option will take you through the free appointment finder workflow.

Booking an appointment from a consultation

The option to book a patient appointment during a consultation is found at the bottom of the 'New consultation' form.

This will open up two options:

1. View appointment book - selecting this option will open up the Appointment Book where you can view appointment diaries with available appointments to book the patient into.
2. Free appointment finder - selecting this option will take you through the free appointment finder workflow.

You can also create a book appointment task if you don't have time to book a follow up appointment during the consultation.

Using the free appointment finder

First, select the appointment service that you'd like to book the patient into.

This will open up a list of dates that have available appointments. Select the date that you'd like to book the appointment on.

Available appointments on the date selected are listed, organised by clinician.

If the diary is an untimed diary, appointment duration which will take place between the start and end time of the diary is shown.

If the diary is timed then the available appointments are shown as timed appointment slots seen in the screenshot below.

Once you've selected an available appointment, you'll be taken to the 'Book appointment' form.

Booking the appointment

All routes to appointment booking take you to the 'New Appointment' form.

Appointment details

Some of the appointment details have been pre-populated in line with the appointment diary settings. You can override the delivery mode, duration or NHS slot category if required.

Reason for appointment

The following fields are optional when booking a patient appointment:

1. Reason for appointment (e.g. cough) - this will be displayed on the booking in the Appointment Book and useful for other staff members to see.
2. High priority checkbox (untimed appointments only) - if the appointment is marked high priority it is prioritised in the untimed appointment queue.
3. Additional information - enter any additional information in this free text box that could be useful for other staff members, for example if the patient requires an interpreter.
4. Redacted from online access checkbox - checking this box will hide the appointment from any patient's viewing appointment information online e.g. NHSapp.

Booking confirmation

The booking confirmation will default to sending the communication to the patient via their preferred channel for contact. However, you can amend this at the time of booking if you'd like.

Note: If you choose to redact the appointment from patient online access, then you'll notice the booking confirmation options disappear. This is to prevent any appointment notifications being sent to the patient to mitigate the risk of others seeing the notifications.

Booking appointments that extend past the appointment diary time

When booking appointments into slots near the end of the appointment diary, it's possible for you to enter a duration that extends past the end time of the diary. This is to enable scenarios where the diary is full but you'd like to accomodate a later appointment.

In this case, Medicus will automatically extend the time of the appointment diary.

Note: If you choose to cancel or reschedule the appointment that extended the diary, the end time of the diary will remain at the extended time. You will need to manually amend this back to the original end time if you want the diary to return to it's original state.