A new patient, Elaine, calls and schedules an appointment for next month. You would like to send her a message welcoming her to the practice and deliver all the forms she'll need to fill out for the first visit. However, you don't want to address an envelope by hand, round up or copy three enclosures, and force her to waste her time filling in information which you have already captured when she scheduled the appointment. This is where attachments will help!
First, using the free-text message area, you should make sure Elaine knows that the e-mail will have attachments:
Second, you need to select which document(s) to send from the list of possibilities. In this case, we are sending Elaine a Patient Registration form, E-mail: guidelines for usage, and Patient History.
This is the part which can be a little confusing: you are attaching forms, but what will the patient actually receive? It's really not too bad! Here is precisely what Rexpert™ does:
- Finds the template you have selected and opens it in Microsoft Word
- Find the account for which you are writing the e-mail
- Looks at the patient-specific information the template wants to merge in, and then merges all possible information.
For example: Elaine's account will already have her name, phone number, e-mail address, gender, and possibly her address, and Rexpert™ will merge that data into the document automatically. Since this is the first time she has been seen at your practice, it probably won't have her insurance information, emergency contact, etc. Everything which the template wants and is available will be included in the form, and blank lines/boxes will be used for everything else.
- Saves the document as a PDF file (since almost everybody can easily open and print in the PDF format).
Next, you should decide which attachments need to be encrypted. Don't get scared by the word "encryption" - in simple terms, it just means that Elaine will need a password to open the attachment.
A good way to decide whether or not to encrypt an attachment is to imagine that the attachment has your grandmother's data merged into it. Would you be comfortable if that document were dropped in the middle of a Wal-Mart parking lot? If not, encrypt it! You will definitely want to encrypt patient registration forms which include a patient's name, social security number, and date of birth. However, a document outlining e-mail policies which only includes a patient name and date might be something your practice decides is not sensitive. When in doubt, encrypt.
Note: There is a way to set up a default for each possible attachment in the Encrypt Attachment field to match your practice's policies. Contact us for more detailed information about this feature. This will enable your practice to make these decisions one time rather than continually burdening busy, multi-tasking, front desk employees.
In Elaine's case, we decided to encrypt the Patient Registration and Patient History attachments:
Rexpert™ will encrypt these attachments with Elaine's personal ePassword, which you should have established with her while on the phone. As a general policy, only communicate the password via voice or in person. NEVER send the password in an e-mail which has encrypted documents attached!!
Final Note: For a scenario like the one outlined above, it can be useful to use the red heart button so that each time you schedule a new patient who has an e-mail address, you will have a welcome message, appropriate attachments, and appropriate encryption choices already set up and ready to go.
If you're not completely comfortable with the process, spend 5 minutes practicing in the system with the account number "test". Set the E-mail (shown on the screen above) to your own personal e-mail address and the ePassword to whatever you choose. Then press the E-mail Patient button and send yourself some nicely encrypted attachments!
