Parts of a Referral
These should be entered for every action or call. It's important to avoid abbreviations or acronyms.
What are Communication Notes in the Referral?
(Excepted: Referral Notes)
This function/feature allows Epic to search for the first available appointment for you based on the date on the calendar and only shows you available times.
What is Solutions or Auto-schedule?
This indicates that pre-certification is required for the listed test. The insurance(s) that requires the pre-cert will appear when you hover over it.
What is the yellow hand icon?
This action prevents anyone from unnecessarily viewing or accessing private patient information on your computer when you've stepped away.
What is locking your computer?
This is the button that CTS should NEVER use for test scheduling. It's mainly used by clinic schedulers when scheduling appointments with physicians.
What is Book It?
This is the default Scheduling Status in the Referral.
What is Ready to Schedule?
These are entered on the Book It screen during scheduling and are used to call out important information for the frontline co-workers or techs.
(Ex: patient needs total lift, patient in wheelchair, etc.)
What are Appt Notes?
This indicates there is a scheduling instruction for the test. Instructions will appear when you click on it.
What is the green referral icon?
Besides the patient's name, these are the two identifiers we ask the patient/person we're speaking with to confirm the patient's identity.
What is the date of birth and last 4 of the SSN?
This lists the patient's unscheduled orders.
What is the Active Requests tab?
This field is located in the general section of the referral and indicates if a referral is Incoming, Internal, or Outgoing.
What is the Class?
This is the facility or location the patient would like to be scheduled at. Epic will only search for appointments available at the selected location(s). This must be selected every time, or Epic will default to look at all locations.
What is the Center?
This indicates there is an Estimate instruction for the test. Instructions will appear when you click on it.
What is the green dollar sign icon?
This is something you should never share with anyone, not even MTS.
What is your password?
This is tab will show all scheduled appointments.
What is the Future tab?
These 2 fields indicate what is being ordered and why. This should NEVER be changed by CTS.
What are the Diagnosis (Diagnoses) and Services?
This appears first when scheduling most tests and prompts you to ask the patient questions. Epic may limit resources (rooms/locations) depending on how the questions are answered.
What is the Decision Tree/Screening Quesionnaire/Safety Questions?
This lists a description or frequently asked questions about the type of test you're looking at. Typically it lists generic information about the modality, not the specific test you're looking at.
What is the FAQ section?
Look HERE to research Mercy's privacy policies.
What is Policy Tech?
This lists all scheduled or cancelled orders. Orders move from the Active Requests tab to this tab after scheduling.
What is the Finalized Requests tab?
This field must be filled in or reviewed every time a service is scheduled or rescheduled to indicate where the appointment is scheduled. You should copy and paste every time.
What is the Department field under the Referred To section?
This action should be taken anytime you are scheduling with a patient, and the appointment is scheduled within the next 30 days.
What is preregister the patient?
Click this to limit available locations to a specific community.
What is Select Community?
This is important to do prior to logging out or locking your workstation to ensure all parts can be accessed by another co-worker if the patient calls in.
What is closing the patient record?
This is the section on the left side of the screen that cannot be collapsed or expanded and is visible on most screens in Epic. It lists basic information like patient info, allergies, and PCP.
What is the Story Board?