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OutSmart Guide

Client Update: Patients Check Their Own Details

Client Update lets a patient check and update their own details: their name, address, phone numbers, email, the details in the “About you” section, their health card and an emergency contact. The patient can do it on a clinic tablet, using a QR code from their workspace, or at home, from a link you email to them.

What the patient enters is not written to their file straight away. It waits in the patient’s workspace until someone on your team reviews it and chooses what to copy, and every detail that is copied is recorded in Change history.

Starting a Client Update

  1. Open the patient’s workspace.
  2. Click the three dots at the top right of the patient card. This is the More actions menu.
  3. Choose Client Update.

A window titled Collect Details From Client opens. It has a QR code for a clinic tablet, and below it, a Send it to the client instead section for emailing the link.

On a clinic tablet

  1. Scan the QR code with the clinic tablet or phone. The code works for five minutes, and the window counts down. Click New Code for a fresh one; the earlier code stops working.
  2. The tablet opens on a screen for your staff, headed Before you hand this over. Choose how the form opens:
    • Show what we have on file opens the form with the details you hold, so the patient checks them and corrects anything wrong.
    • Start with a blank form opens it empty, so the patient fills everything in themselves. Anything they leave empty keeps its current value.
  3. Hand the tablet to the patient.
  4. The patient checks or fills in their details. The form also asks for their health card and an emergency contact.
  5. They tap Review my answers, check the summary, and tap Send to the clinic.
  6. A thank-you screen asks them to return the device to the clinic staff.

The patient’s details are only shown once you have chosen Show what we have on file, so scanning the code alone never displays them. The form closes if it is left untouched for 30 minutes, and the patient is warned first and can carry on with one tap.

When the patient has finished, reload the workspace so the review window opens. The Collect Details From Client window reminds you to do this.

By email

When the patient is not in the clinic, use the Send it to the client instead section at the bottom of the Collect Details From Client window.

  1. Check the email address. It is filled in from the patient’s file, and you can change it.
  2. Click Email the link.

The patient receives an email from your clinic with a link to the same form. The link:

  • asks the patient for their date of birth first, when you have one on file. Five wrong answers close the link;
  • always opens the form empty, so it never shows the patient what is on file;
  • works for seven days, or until the patient submits it.

Emailing a new link replaces the previous emailed link. A QR code shown in the clinic and an emailed link do not cancel each other, so a patient who already has a link in their inbox can still use it.

Reviewing what the patient entered

The next time a practitioner or admin who can edit that patient opens the patient’s workspace, a window titled New details from the patient opens by itself. It says how the patient entered the details, for example on the clinic tablet or through the link the clinic emailed to them.

The window shows each detail with what is On file now beside what The patient entered:

  • A detail that matches the file is greyed out and marked Same.
  • A detail that differs is already checked off for you, ready to copy.
  • First name, middle name, last name and date of birth are never checked for you. Check them yourself if you want to copy them.
  • An emergency contact is not kept on the patient’s file, so copying one adds a workspace note labelled Emergency Alert.

Click the blue Copy the ticked details button to copy every detail that is checked off to the patient’s file, or Do not copy anything to close the review without changing it. The window can only be closed with one of those two buttons, so the details are never lost by accident. The same review window is used for details a patient enters in a SmartForms V2 form; see Asking Patients For Their Details In A Smart Form.

Change history

Every change to a patient’s details is recorded, with what it was before and after, when it changed, and who made the change. Open the patient card’s More actions menu and choose Change history to see it. A change copied from a Client Update reads, for example, Entered by the patient on the clinic tablet. Copied by followed by the staff member’s name.

Who can use it

You need the same permission to start a Client Update, and to review and copy what the patient entered, that you need to edit a patient’s details directly from the patient card.

Troubleshooting

The QR code says it has expired

The code works for five minutes. Click New Code in the Collect Details From Client window and scan the new one.

The link closes after seven days, after it has been submitted, after five wrong dates of birth, or when a newer link is emailed. Email a new link from the Collect Details From Client window.

The review window did not open

Reload the patient’s workspace. If it still does not open, the patient may not have tapped Send to the clinic, or someone may already have reviewed the details. Change history shows what was copied.