Medicus Chat

Purpose

The Medicus Chat is an instant messenger tool that supports direct messages and group conversations. The tool can be used to:

1. Facilitate discussions between clinicians about a patient.
2. Facilitate a discussion between one or many staff members.
3. Facilitate a discussion between whole teams.

This user guide will show you how to utilise the Medicus Chat functionality.

Note: You should not use the Medicus chat for clinically urgent communications. For this, you should use the panic button.

Overview

There are two main message types in Medicus chat:

1. Direct message - a direct message is a one-to-one chat with another staff member.
2. Conversation - a conversation around a particular topic which can be archived at a later date. Conversations can also be used to facilitate discussion between a group of people or a team.

The Medicus chat can be found in the left hand side navigation bar. This is where you can start a new direct message or conversation from.

Any unread messages appear on the homepage navigation between your outstanding tasks.

Depending on the message type, the unread messages will fall under different sections:

1. Direct messages
2. General conversations
3. Patient conversations - these are conversations linked to a particular patient

You'll also notice the chat icon has a green circle to indicate there are unread messages.

To start a new message you can either click on the chat icon or use the hotkey Ctrl/cmd + shift + C.

This will open up the Medicus chat pop out to either search for a staff member to send them a direct message, or start a new conversation.

Direct Messaging

To start a new direct message, search and select the staff member you'd like to message.

You'll be taken to your conversation with this staff member. Any historical messages will be visible here.

Type your message and press Send.

The message will be visible in your chat and the other staff member will be notified that they have a new direct message.

When you receive a reply, you'll be notified that you have an unread direct messages. Clicking on this will take you to your chat. New messages have a green circle in the top right hand corner.

If you need to edit a message after it has already been sent, you can select Edit to update the content.

You can also delete previously send messages through the same mechanism.

Conversations

Conversations can be accessed in the same way that direct messages are.

To start a new conversation, select New Conversation.

This will take you to the New Conversation form where you'll need to enter a title and select the participants to include.

You can also add or remove participants in a conversation by selecting Click here at the bottom of the page.

Conversations can then be archived from the actions menu.

Linking a conversation to a patient

If you want to have a conversation about a specific patient, you can check the box that says The conversation is about a specific patient.

Selecting Choose patient will bring up the patient finder for you to choose the patient from.

A link to any conversations about a specific patient can be found in the Audit page on the patient's care record.