copyright 2005,  Welford Medical Computing, Inc.  All rights reserved

APPOINTMENT GRID MODE (User's Manual, pgs. 882-882)

You can find open appointments or see which days are heavier and lighter at a glance using the Appointment Grid Mode. Grid Mode shows 1 week's worth of appointments on a single screen, with the text removed from the boxes (except for the row headings showing the time of day and the column headings showing the date).

To view appointments in Grid Mode, simply click on the Grid Mode button just to the left of the Days box in the Appointment Scheduler, or press GoTo\Mode: Grid. To switch back to the usual view, click the Regular Mode button (where the Grid Mode button was), or press GoTo\Mode: Regular.

You can adjust the settings of Grid Mode by pressing View\Appointments\Options. Set the Grid Row Height to a height that allows you to see an entire days' appointments on a single screen. (This number will vary depending upon how close together your appointment times are and the resolution of your screen. A typical setting is 10). Set the Grid Point Size to change the size of the font that is used in Grid Mode to display the dates and times; increase it to a number that makes these readable for you without exceeding the space allowed in the grid to show an individual date or time. (A typical setting is 8 or 10) Set the Grid Font to one which looks readable to you in the Grid Point Size you have chosen. The Grid Font shows you how the font you have chosen looks in the Grid Point Size you have chosen. (Ms Sans Serif is usually a good font to use). (If you are having problems getting this feature to work, contact MEDCOM Information Systems for a revised version).

In order for Grid Mode to show you the open appointment slots (which appear in white), you must assign a background color to each of your Appointment Procedure Types (other than white) so that only the open slots appear in white. (If you don't assign background colors, the factory default is for all appointments to appear with a white background, meaning that they won't look different from the open slots). To assign background colors to your Appointment Procedure Types, press View\Appointments\Edit\Procedure Type, and for each Procedure Type, click on Color\Background and select a color other than white. For further information, review the June, 2004 Newsletter or see the User's Manual, page 804. Note that forbidden slots are colored red and warning slots are colored yellow by default, so you should avoid using these colors for Appointment Procedure Type background colors, or else you can change the colors for Forbidden and Warning slots using the Colors page in View\Appointment\Options (User's Manual, pg. 51).

In the above example, you can see at a glance that Wednesday is full (no white slots), whereas Monday, Thursday and Friday have lots of openings. You might wish to move some people out of Wednesday to make room for emergencies that crop up on Wednesday.

Note that you can view and edit appointments while in Grid Mode just like when you are in regular mode. For example, if you want to add an appointment to an open slot, simply double-click on that opening, and the Edit Appointment window opens, set to the date and time you double-clicked on.

When you switch back to Regular Mode, the display returns to showing however many days and Providers you had it set to before you switched to Grid Mode.

Using Grid Mode can make it quick and easy to find open slots and to balance out your schedule. You can, of course, also find open slots using View\Appointment\Search, which can handle more sophisticated search criteria such as limiting the search to particular days of the week and time slots, but some users prefer to spot openings visually using the Grid Mode.

Many practices like to mark which appointments are Completed, No-Show, etc. You can do this by highlighting an appointment and either double-clicking it or by pressing Edit\Appointment, then by changing the Completion field to the desired value.

However, it is quicker and easier to simply right click on the appointment in the grid, then select the Completion value from the menu. In order for this feature to work, you must first have checked View\Appointments\Options\Use mouse to move appointments. (Otherwise, the program ignores the mouse when used on an appointment slot).

Remember that appointments are automatically marked as No-Show if the patient doesn't have a Visit recorded in the Visiter after <n> hours have elapsed from the appointment time if you have set View\Appointments\Options\Auto No-Show after <n> hours to a value other than 0 hours.

This month we are releasing the October, 2005 Quarterly update. The update includes new medications, diagnostic terms, drug interactions, drug dosing information, spelling words, drug-disease Alerts, Web Links, algorithms, medication test reminders, cross-reacting allergies, and dozens of new patient education brochures. This update has over 6500 drug interactions with over 2300 references, over 11,000 Alerts, over 9800 Web Links, and over 1300 Brochures, including new or revised Brochures on atopic dermatitis, bipolar disorder, cervical radiculopathy, coronary artery disease, hyperhidrosis, insomnia, malignant hyperthermia, menopause, prostate cancer, pulmonary hypertension, sarcoma, systemic lupus erythematous, smoking, donepezil, efavirenz, exenatide, iloprost, pramlintide, tigecycline, and many others.

We are hard at work on version 4.9. It will allow you to transfer appointments to a new Provider when you delete a Provider from the Appointment Scheduler. Please let us know if there are new features you would like to see included.

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Welford Medical Computing, Inc.    or      MEDCOM Information Systems

3779 Hermitage Trail                                 2117 Stonington Avenue

Rockford, IL 61114                                    Hoffman Estates, IL 60195