You can add "contacts" to a patient's profile to denote emergency contacts, next of kin, or other familial or social relationships. Contacts can be set to receive reminders whenever the patient receives a reminder and can also be set as the payer of an invoice on the patient's behalf.
You can also set contacts to be Medicare claimants so that they receive the rebate on the patient's behalf.
When a contact is added to a patient's profile, a separate profile is created for the contact (but not added to your Patient List). You can access the contact's profile by clicking the contact's name in the Contact Details section of the patient's profile. You can edit the contact's details as required.
If in time the contact also becomes a patient, all you need to do is change the status of the "Contact" to "Current". This changes the contact profile into a patient profile and makes the profile appear in your Patient List.
Each contact can be assigned to more than one patient, and each patient can have multiple contacts. You can see the full list of patients that each contact is assigned to in the Contact Details section of the contact's profile:
When adding a contact to the patient's profile, you have the option to include this contact to receive reminders in relation to the patient's appointments. There is also the option to include the contact in any campaigns that the patient is included in and you can set the contact to be the payer of the invoice that is billed for the patient appointments.
The Contact section is often used for patients/guardians of minors. These patients parents will need to be added as contacts to receive reminders for the appointments and any emails related to this patient/updates in relation to a practice. You will also be able to set the parents as the payer of the invoice so that they can pay the invoice, after the appointment with their child.
To add a contact to a patient profile:
Navigate to the patient's profile by clicking their name from your Patient List, from an invoice or from an appointment.
In the Contact details section, click Add Contact.
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The Add Contact pop-up appears. Select a Relationship and Contact Type for your records.
In the Name field, type the contact's name. If the contact has been previously added or is also one of your patients, select their name from the drop-down menu that appears. Otherwise click to add them as a new contact.
Enter the contact's phone number(s) and email address.
Select whether to enable or disable reminders for this contact - if enabled, the contact will also be sent a reminder whenever the patient is sent a reminder. This is particularly useful for parents/guardians.
Click Save.
You can assign invoices to be paid by a contact instead of the patient. To do so:
From an invoice, click the cogwheel icon at the top-right hand side of the page.
In the Payer field, ensure the payer is set to Patient.
In the Contact/Family Member field, select the contact you wish to bill.
Click Submit.
Image: Setting the payer of an invoice to the contact instead of the patient (expand image)
RESULT: The invoice is now billed to the contact instead of the patient.
In order for the contact to receive reminders for this patient, when you are adding the contact to the patients profile ensure that the Reminders are set to "Enabled" in the "Edit Contact" pop up:
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You can change this setting at any time by navigating to the patient's profile and then clicking the Edit (pencil) icon beside the contact's name.
When you are about to send the campaign to patients, ensure that you tick the "Notify Contacts" checkbox in the "Save Campaign" pop-up. This will send the communication to the patient's contacts as well as the patient.
If you are sharing a clinical note with the patient, there is an option to CC in one of the patient's contacts.
For other communication, you will need to manually email the contact.
Contacts will not appear on the patient list, so if you set a patient's status to Contact, they will not appear in your patient list.
You can create a list of contacts assigned to your practice by running a patient report with the report type set to Contact. To do so:
Click Reports > Patient.
Click New Report at the top-right of the page.
In the Report Type field, select Contact.
Click Run.
RESULT: A list of contacts will be created as a report. You can click on any contact to go to their profile and change a contact to a patient if required.
In the Message History section of a contact's profile, tick the checkbox labelled "Include all contacts". This will include communication sent to the contact that they received specifically as another person's contact.
In order to change the status of a contact to patient, all you need to do is go to their contact profile and change their status from "Contact" to "Current". To do so:
Navigate to the contact's profile.
Click Edit at the top-right of the page.
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In the Personal Details section, click the Status drop-down menu and change the status from "Contact" to "Current".
RESULT: The contact profile will be changed to a patient profile and will appear in your Patient List. Note that once the profile has been changed to a patient profile, they still remain listed as a contact and will continue to receive reminders and campaigns according to your settings.
An emergency contact is already an existing patient in my practice. Will I have to create a new contact profile for this patient?
No. When you are adding the contact to the patient's profile, simply type the name of the contact in the Name field - because the contact already exists as a patient in your Halaxy, the contact's name should automatically appear in the drop-down menu. Click the name to link the contact using their existing patient profile.
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