1. 11
Scheduling

2. Learning Outcomes When you finish this chapter, you will be able to:
11-2
When you finish this chapter, you will be able to:
List the four main areas of the Office Hours window.
Demonstrate how to enter an appointment.
Demonstrate how to schedule a follow-up appointment.
Demonstrate how to search for an available time slot.
Demonstrate how to book an appointment for a new patient.
Demonstrate how to book repeating appointments.
Demonstrate how to reschedule an appointment.

3. Learning Outcomes (Continued)
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When you finish this chapter, you will be able to:
Demonstrate how to create a recall list.
Demonstrate how to enter provider breaks in the schedule.
Demonstrate how to print a provider’s schedule.
Demonstrate how to create an overdue balance report for upcoming appointments.

4. Key Terms 11-4 Office Hours break Office Hours calendar
Office Hours patient information
provider’s daily schedule
provider selection box
Teaching Notes:
Have students define all key terms as an assignment. Then, in class, ask each student to define one key term aloud.
Optional assignment: Have students do an Internet search of one key term and write a short paragraph describing what they learned about that term from looking at a few websites.

5. 11.1 The Office Hours Window
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Medisoft provides a special program called Office Hours to handle appointment scheduling
The Office Hours program has its own window, including its own menu bar and toolbar
Learning Outcome: 11.1 List the four main areas of the Office Hours window.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Appointment scheduling is one of the most important tasks in a medical office.
Different medical procedures take different lengths of time, and each appointment must be the right length.
A patient should not be kept waiting more than a few minutes for a physician nor and a physician wants to go from patient to patient effortlessly.
The Office Hours menu bar lists the menus available: File, Edit, View, Lists, Reports, Tools, and Help
Table 11.3

6. 11.1 The Office Hours Window (Continued)
11-6
Office Hours contains four main areas:
The provider selection box, located at the far-right end of the toolbar, is used to select a provider
The provider’s daily schedule, shown in the right half of the screen, is a listing of time slots for a particular day for a specific provider
The Office Hours calendar is used to select or change dates
The area just below the calendar contains Office Hours patient information about the patient who is selected in the provider’s daily schedule
Learning Outcome: 11.1 List the four main areas of the Office Hours window.
Pages:

7. 11.1 The Office Hours Window (Continued)
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The four main areas of Office Hours
Learning Outcome: 11.1 List the four main areas of the Office Hours window.
Pages:

8. 11.2 Entering Appointments
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To enter an appointment in Office Hours:
Select the provider for whom the appointment is being scheduled
Choose the date of the desired appointment
Appointments are then entered by clicking the Appointment Entry shortcut button or by double-clicking in a time slot on the schedule
Learning Outcome: 11.2 Demonstrate how to enter an appointment.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Office Hours can be started from within Medisoft or directly from Windows.
Choosing the correct provider is very important when beginning the appointment making process.
Dates are changed by clicking the Day, Week, Month, and Year right and left arrow buttons located under the calendar.

9. 11.2 Entering Appointments (Continued)
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Time slots on the schedule
Learning Outcome: 11.2 Demonstrate how to enter an appointment.
Pages:

10. 11.2 Entering Appointments (Continued)
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To enter an appointment (continued):
After selecting a time slot, the New Appointment Entry dialog box is displayed, which contains information about the patient and the appointment, such as:
▪ Chart No. ▪ Name ▪ Phone Nos.
▪ Resource ▪ Note ▪ Case
▪ Reason ▪ Length ▪ Date
▪ Time ▪ Provider ▪ Repeat
Learning Outcome: 11.2 Demonstrate how to enter an appointment.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Chart chosen from the Chart drop-down list. If you are setting up an appointment for a new patient who has not been assigned a chart number, skip the chart box, and key the patient’s name in the blank box to the right of the Chart box.
Home Phone patient’s home phone number is automatically entered in the Home Phone box.
Cell Phone patient’s cell phone number is automatically entered in the Cell Phone box.
Resource This box is used if the practice assigns codes to resources, such as exam rooms or equipment.
Note Any special information about an appointment is entered in the Note box.
Case The case that pertains to the appointment is selected from the drop-down list of cases.
Reason Reason codes can be set up in the program to reflect the reason for an appointment.
Length The amount of time an appointment will take (in minutes) is entered in the Length box by keying the number of minutes or using the up and down arrows.
Date The Date box displays the date that is currently displayed on the calendar. If this is not the desired date, it may be changed by keying in a different date or by clicking the arrow button and selecting a date from the pop-up calendar that appears.
Time The Time box displays the appointment time that is currently selected on the schedule. If this is not the desired time, it may be changed by keying in a different time.
Provider selected from the drop-down list of providers.
Repeat The Repeat box is used to enter appointments that recur on a regular basis.
Perform Exercise 11-1 and Exercise 11-2

11. 11.2 Entering Appointments (Continued)
11-11
After the New Appointment Entry dialog box is completed, clicking the Save button enters the information on the schedule
New Appointment
Entry dialog box
Learning Outcome: 11.2 Demonstrate how to enter an appointment.

12. 11.3 Booking Follow-Up Appointments
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To search for a future appointment in Office Hours, use the Go to a Date shortcut button on the toolbar
The Go to Date dialog box is displayed, allowing the user to search by days, weeks, months, and years from the currently selected date
Learning Outcome: 11.3 Demonstrate how to schedule a follow-up appointment.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Used for a patient that needs a follow-up appointment at a certain time in the future.
Make sure you have the right provider selected before beginning.

13. 11.3 Booking Follow-Up Appointments (Continued)
11-13
Use the five options in the Go to Date dialog box to choose a future date
After a future date option has been selected, clicking the Go button closes the dialog box and begins the search
The future date is located and that date’s calendar schedule is displayed
Learning Outcome: 11.3 Demonstrate how to schedule a follow-up appointment.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Perform Exercises 11-3, 11-4

14. 11.4 Searching for Available Time Slots
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The Find Open Time dialog box is used to search for the next available appointment, with filters for length of appointment, and acceptable hours and days of the week
Learning Outcome: 11.4 Demonstrate how to search for an available time slot.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Search for available appointment space on a particular day of the week and at a specific time.
Perform Exercise 11-5, 11-6

15. 11.5 Entering Appointments for New Patients
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Appointments can be scheduled in Office Hours before patient information is entered in Medisoft
To book the appointment, double-click in the schedule and key the patient’s first and last name in the blank box to the right of the Chart box
It is possible to enter an appointment before a chart number has been assigned to a patient
Learning Outcome: 11.5 Demonstrate how to book an appointment for a new patient.
Page: 390
Teaching Notes:
Most offices obtain basic data and enter it in the appropriate Medisoft dialog boxes (Patient/Guarantor and Case) while the patient is still on the phone making the appointment.
For those practices that allow patients to schedule their own appointments online, information can be gathered at that time.
Perform Exercise 11-7

16. 11.6 Booking Repeated Appointments
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Some patients require appointments on a repeated basis
The Repeat Change button at the bottom of the New Appointment Entry dialog box is used
Learning Outcome: 11.6 Demonstrate how to book repeating appointments.
Pages:

17. 11.6 Booking Repeated Appointments (Continued)
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The Repeat Change feature is used to schedule repeated appointments on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis
Learning Outcome: 11.6 Demonstrate how to book repeating appointments.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
An option is provided to indicate how often the appointments should be scheduled, such as once every week.
Perform Exercise 11-8

18. 11.7 Rescheduling and Canceling Appointments
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Changing an appointment is accomplished with the Cut and Paste commands on the Office Hours Edit menu
Cut the appointment from the old time slot and paste it in the new one
Appointments can be canceled and not rescheduled simply by using the Cut command
A right-click on the mouse will also display a pop-up menu with these options
Learning Outcome: 11.7 Demonstrate how to reschedule an appointment.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
The following steps are used to reschedule an appointment:
1. Locate the appointment that needs to be changed. Make sure the appointment slot is visible on the schedule.
2. Click on the existing time-slot box. A black border surrounds the slot to indicate that it is selected.
3. Click Cut on the Edit menu. The appointment disappears from the schedule.
4. Click the date on the calendar when the appointment is to be rescheduled.
5. Click the desired time-slot box on the schedule. The slot becomes active.
6. Click Paste on the Edit menu. The patient’s name appears in the new time-slot box.
The following steps are used to cancel an appointment without rescheduling:
1. Locate the appointment on the schedule.
2. Click the time-slot box to select the appointment.
Perform Exercise 11-9

19. 11.8 Adding a Patient to the Recall List
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When patient appointments are scheduled well in advance, it is practical to set up reminders
In Medisoft, a recall list can be created and maintained by clicking Patient Recall on the Lists menu
The Patient Recall List dialog box is displayed
Patients can also be added to the recall list by clicking the Patient Recall Entry shortcut button on the toolbar
Learning Outcome: 11.8 Demonstrate how to create a recall list.
Pages:

20. 11.8 Adding a Patient to the Recall List (Continued)
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The Patient Recall List dialog box organizes the recall information in a column format
Learning Outcome: 11.8 Demonstrate how to create a recall list.
Pages:

21. 11.8 Adding a Patient to the Recall List (Continued)
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Add patients to the recall list by clicking the New button in the Patient Recall List dialog box or by clicking the Patient Recall Entry shortcut button
The Patient Recall dialog box is displayed, completed and then saved
Learning Outcome: 11.8 Demonstrate how to create a recall list.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Perform Exercise11-10

22. 11.9 Creating Provider Breaks
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The Office Hours break is a block of time when a physician is unavailable for appointments with patients
This feature is used so that appointments are not booked when a physician will be unavailable
Physicians are sometimes unavailable due to personal or work-related reasons
Learning Outcome: 11.9 Demonstrate how to enter provider breaks in the schedule.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Examples of breaks include Lunch, Meeting, Personal, Emergency, Break, Vacation, Seminar, Holiday, Trip, and Surgery.
Can be created one at a time or on a recurring basis for all providers.

23. 11.9 Creating Provider Breaks (Continued)
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To set up a break for a listed provider, click the Break Entry shortcut button
The New Break Entry dialog box will appear, where the information is entered, and saved
Learning Outcome: 11.9 Demonstrate how to enter provider breaks in the schedule.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Perform Exercise 11-11

24. 11.10 Printing Schedules
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To view a list of all appointments for a provider for a given day, click Appointment List from the Office Hours Reports menu
The report can be previewed on the screen, and then printed, or sent directly to the printer by clicking the Print Appointment List shortcut button
Various buttons are used to view the schedule at different sizes, move from page to page, print the schedule, and save the schedule as a file
Learning Outcome: Demonstrate how to print a provider’s schedule.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Schedules are printed on a daily basis.
Perform Exercise 11-12

25. 11.11 Creating an Overdue Balance Report for Patients with Appointments
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It is much easier to collect on overdue accounts when the patient is in the office, rather than by phone or mail
In Medisoft, the Appointment List with Remainder Balance report provides account balance information
Learning Outcome: Demonstrate how to create an overdue balance report for upcoming appointments.
Pages:
Teaching Notes:
Perform Exercise 11-13