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Administrative
Add and manage patients, manage appointments and manage transport.
Appointments
Use Communicare appointments to book future appointments and record services provided without an appointment, for example, walk-in patients.
Appointment Details
When booking an appointment, after you have selected a timeslot and the patient, the Appointment Details window is displayed.

Administrative
Add and manage patients, manage appointments and manage transport.
- Patients
  Communicare uses the term Patient to refer to the clients of a health service.
- Appointments
  Use Communicare appointments to book future appointments and record services provided without an appointment, for example, walk-in patients.
  - Working with the Appointment Book
    Use the Appointment Book to add sessions, book and change appointments, and check patient's in.
  - Appointment Details
    When booking an appointment, after you have selected a timeslot and the patient, the Appointment Details window is displayed.
  - Cancelling and rescheduling appointments manually
    You can cancel or reschedule one or more patients' appointments in the Appointment Book at any time before the consultation starts.
  - Appointment timeslots
    A timeslot is the period in which an appointment is booked. Timeslots can be of any duration.
  - Appointment session
    An appointment session is the period of time for which a Provider and Facility are allocated to provide services. Sessions are normally divided into timeslots.
  - Appointment Session Status
    Session Status is used to indicate the condition of sessions and session templates.
  - Appointment Session Insertion
    The Session Templates List is displayed when you insert a session into the Appointment Book.
  - Patient Appointment and Service History
    From the Appointment Book or clinical record, use the Service List window to view a list of all upcoming appointments for a patient, and a patient's appointment and service history.
  - Walk-in patients
    Walk-in patients are those who arrive without an appointment. That is, they just walk in.
  - Simultaneous Check-In
    The Simultaneous Check-In window is displayed when checking in a patient who has more than one appointment today. It allows patients with multiple appointments to be efficiently managed through services with multiple providers.
  - Appointment Cancellation Reason
    Use the Appointment Cancellation Reason window to indicate a broad reason category for an appointment cancellation.
  - Online Appointment Booking
    Online appointment booking systems allow patients to find an available provider and appointment time slots 24 hours a day, without the need to interact with the health service to book an appointment.
  - Appointment Book report
    Use the Appointment Book report to print the appointments book in a format that can be used in an emergency as a paper appointments book. It is also useful when reviewing the setup of the appointments book.
  - SMS messages and reminders
    In Communicare V21.1 and later, you can send appointment reminders to patients using Telstra Health's SMS gateway (TH Messaging) and a new interface.
  - SMS messaging using Burst
    Set up SMS messaging so that your health service can send SMS messages to patients using Burst.
- Transport
  Communicare offers two ways of managing transport services.

Appointment Details

When booking an appointment, after you have selected a timeslot and the patient, the Appointment Details window is displayed.

The patient's name and appointment information is displayed. You can't edit the appointment date or time here. Instead, click Cancel and move or reschedule the appointment.

To complete appointment details:

If you need to view or update the patient's details, click Biographics.
If required, in the Booking Comment field, add booking information. This is displayed as a service message in the Service Recording window. For example, the urgency of the appointment.
If required, in the Operator Initials field, enter your initials. If no initials are entered, the login username is instead recorded. If initials are entered, both the login username and the initials are recorded.
If you want to make this a double appointment, set Append next timeslot. Communicare merges this timeslot with the next if it is available.
If required, from the Appointment Type list, select the type of appointment. If you are booking an appointment from the Incoming Referral Details window, you must select an appointment type.
In the Booking Requirements list, set any booking requirements and type any comments.
When the Transport Management module is enabled, any Transport requirement is replaced with the Transport Management functionality. To add a transport requirement with the relevant information from the appointment booking, set Transport Management. To display the transport requirements for the patient, select the blue Transport link.
Click Save.

14 November 2023