How Ocean interacts with integrated EMR booking systems
Prerequisites
- Your Ocean Site must be integrated with your EMR using Ocean Cloud Connect.
- Your EMR Schedule(s) must be activated for use in Online Booking under a 'Patient Engagement Licence (Plus)'. To do this, please refer to the following article: Adding Ocean Licences.
- Your Ocean Site must have a validated Directory Listing. Details from the Directory Listing are used to populate your clinic's information on the confirmation page and/or email to the patient.
The Scheduler
- Set Booking Time and Clear Booking Time. Using the Set Booking Time and Clear Booking Time to indicate bookable time slots in your schedule. Unavailable time slots will be denoted with a violet "x" in the PS Suite schedule.
- Booking Filler Appointments. Time slots with patients assigned are unavailable for online booking. You can also block off a time slot by putting a description in the "Details" field of the time slot in your PS Suite schedule - such as "no online booking", "lunch", "meeting", etc. When the "Details" field is filled, Ocean will see that slot as unavailable.
- PS Suite Appointment Types. For advanced restrictions, such as a maximum number of a certain appointment type per day, or different availability based on the type of appointment being booked, you will be required to use EMR Appointment Type Mapping along with creating placeholder Appointment Types in PS Suite. You must include "online booking" or "/ob" in the title of these placeholder appointment types.
Warning for PS Suite users:
Ocean does not recognize background text and colour from the PS Suite scheduler. Time slots marked with only background text or colour using the 'Recurrent Text & Colour' feature in PS Suite will be seen as open, bookable time slots to Ocean. Do not attempt to block off time slots in the schedule by changing the slots using this feature.
Telus does not make these background colours available to third-party systems like Ocean, so the online booking engine is unable to determine their existence. As far as Ocean can see, a slot with a blue background with no appointment is the same as a slot with a white background with no appointment.
- Ocean can only book appointments in empty time slots, or predetermined Template slots of your EMR. You can select the time slots for Ocean to book into in the Edit Booking Schedule page.
- There are several ways you can make slots unavailable for online booking.
- Template Slots. Template slots that you do not want to be booked online by patients should be de-selected in the Booking Schedule configuration (under the “Allow patients to book within these template slots” setting).
- Working Hours. Ocean can read from the working hours setting and will not book appointments on dates and time slots that are marked as non-working hours.
- Booking Filler Appointments. Time slots with patients assigned are unavailable for online booking. To do this, first click the appointment time in Med Access that you want to block off. Next, click "Menu", and then click "Set Type of Appt", and finally click "Blocked". From here, you should be able to input "no online booking" in the description field and specify the time frame you desire to block off.
- Ocean can only book appointments in predetermined Appointment Type Suggestions slots in your EMR. You can select Appointment Type Suggestions in the Edit Booking Schedule page. Please note that only suggestions that are Active will be selectable in Ocean. Appointment suggestions must also have the "Allow Accuro Appointment Creation" setting checked.
- When booking appointments, Ocean will look for any other appointments booked across columns in the scheduler. If an appointment exists in an adjacent column, Ocean will consider that time slot not bookable. Ocean can only book appointments into the first column in the scheduler.
- A time slot filled by an appointment with a patient assigned will never appear bookable online.
- There are several ways you can make slots unavailable for online booking:
- Book Day Off: Days that have been marked as Book Day Off will not appear bookable online.
- Booking Filler Appointments: To do this, first click the appointment time that you want to block off. Next, add some detail in the “Notes” field of the appointment (e.g. “Lunch” or “Teaching”), click “Ok”. Ocean will make this slot unavailable for online booking.
Accuro 'Resource Scheduling' Mode
Ocean Online Booking is not compatible with Accuro EMR instances that use the legacy 'Resource Scheduling' mode.
Please contact the QHR Client Services (support@QHRtech.com) team to disable Resource Scheduling if you wish to use Ocean Online Booking.
- Ocean can book appointments in time slots without template codes, however Ocean can’t see the start hour, end hour or period in your schedules preferences. You must provide this information in the Edit Booking Schedule page, by setting the EMR time slot interval and by using the Day/Time restrictions
- Ocean can book in time slots with specified template codes. You can determine which of these ways Ocean will book into in the Edit Booking Schedule page.
- A time slot filled by an appointment with a patient assigned will never appear bookable online.
- To make time slots unavailable for online booking via the OSCAR Pro schedule:
- The "Do Not Book" feature: Using the “Do Not Book” feature available in the OSCAR Pro schedule will prevent those time slot(s) from being bookable through Ocean online booking. To do this, first click the appointment time that you want to block off. Next, click the 'Not book' button, and then click 'Add Appointment'. This will prevent the time slot(s) from being bookable through Ocean online booking.
- Booking Filler Appointments: To do this, first click the appointment time that you want to block off. Next, add some detail in the “Notes” field of the appointment (e.g. “Lunch” or “Teaching”), click “Add Appointment”. This will prevent the time slot(s) from being bookable through Ocean online booking.
Primary Providers
Ocean can apply restrictions for online booking based on the patient's provider - for example, if only Dr. Kavanagh's patients should be able to book online into Dr. Kavanagh's EMR schedule. Clinics may set primary providers differently in their EMR - please see below to learn which fields Ocean looks at for each EMR.
A note on searching providers in your EMR.
In PSS: Click Appointments to open the EMR scheduler. In the top menu, click Providers -> View One Provider to view a list of all providers in your EMR.
In Med Access: Click the dropdown menu under Provider or Resource to view a list of all providers in your EMR.
In Accuro: Press F2 to open the Provider Management window.
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Ocean has the ability to evaluate the following provider fields from the patient's chart in PS Suite:
- • Patient's MD/NP
- • Family MD/NP
- • Primary Provider
- • Other Provider
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- Note: The provider's name(s) in the above field(s) field must match the name(s) in the User's First Name and Surname in the Edit Users Dialog.
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Ocean has the ability to evaluate the following provider fields from the patient's chart in Med Access:
- • Primary Provider
- • Secondary Provider
- • Family Provider
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Note: The provider name that is being pushed out by Med Access is the text description and does not always match the provider name in Med Access. Please ensure that the provider names in Med Access are consistent.
- Ocean will treat the Office Provider as the patient's primary provider.
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Ocean has the ability to evaluate the following provider fields from the patient's chart in OSCAR Pro:
- • Physician/MRP
- • Family Doctor
- • Health Care Team
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Reason for Visit
During the online appointment booking process, patients must fill out a customizable Pre-Booking Form (such as the Online Booking - Family Medicine eForm).
- Pre-Booking Forms can be configured to ask the patient a variety of questions, although they commonly request the patient to specify their desired Appointment Type and Reason for Visit.
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- The Reason for Visit question item is often configured to map to the special 'reasonForVisit' eForm item reference, which subsequently populates the corresponding "reason" field directly within the appointment in the EMR. The specific "reason" field for each EMR is outlined below:
- For PS Suite, the 'reasonForVisit' Ocean eForm item response will appear within the 'Details' field of the appointment.
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- For Med Access, the 'reasonForVisit' Ocean eForm item response will appear within the 'Concern' field of the appointment.
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- For Accuro, the 'reasonForVisit' Ocean eForm item response will appear within the 'Notes' field of the appointment.
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- For OSCAR Pro, the 'reasonForVisit' Ocean eForm item response will appear within the 'Reason' field of the appointment.
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