Add a patient

A new chart needs only the patient's name, date of birth and one way to reach the patient or their guardian. You can complete everything else on the chart afterwards.

Create the chart#

1. Open Patients and click New Patient.
2. Enter the Legal first name, Legal last name and Date of birth. Add a Preferred name if the patient goes by another name; it shows next to the legal name, and claims and statements still use the legal name.
3. Choose Sex as claims should report it and the starting Status: Active, or Referral for a patient who has not started treatment.
4. Pick a Default location. It starts at the location you are working in (the one chosen at the top of the menu), or empty when you work in all locations. If you work at only some of the clinic's locations, choose one of yours so you can open the chart afterwards.
5. If a school district, a referral partner or your former system already has an id for the patient, turn on Has an id in another system and enter the External id. No two charts can share one.
6. Under Phone and email, click Add phone or Add email and enter at least one. It is marked as required: the patient needs a phone number or email address, or their legal guardian does when you add one.
7. Click Create Patient. The chart opens on the Demographics tab.

If the patient looks like someone who already has a chart, the dialog lists the likely matches before it saves. Open the existing chart instead, or enter a reason and click Create Anyway; see duplicate charts and merging.

If your role lets you see only your caseload, NeatPractice adds you to the new patient's care team as primary therapist, so the chart stays open to you. This needs an active provider profile.

Each new chart gets the next chart number automatically: 1001, 1002 and so on, with your clinic's prefix if it set one in patient settings.

Import patients from a file#

To bring in many patients at once, such as when you move from another system, open Patients, open the actions menu and click Import CSV.

1. Click Blank template to download the columns: last_name, first_name and date_of_birth are required; preferred_name, sex (F, M or U), phone, email, the address columns, guardian_first_name, guardian_last_name, guardian_relationship and external_id (the patient's id in your former system) are optional. Dates read as 2015-04-30 or 4/30/2015. To move a whole practice, with payers, physicians and coverages too, use Data import.
2. Choose the file and, if you like, the Default location every imported patient starts at.
3. NeatPractice checks every row before saving anything. Rows with a problem (a missing name, a date it cannot read, a minor with no guardian, a state that is not a two-letter code, a ZIP code that is not 5 or 9 digits, an address or city that is too long, an external id another chart or an earlier row already has) are listed; fix them and choose the file again, because nothing imports while any row has a problem.
4. Rows that look like a patient you already have, or like an earlier row of the same file, are listed as possible duplicates and left out. Select the ones that really are new patients and say why; the reason stays on each chart.
5. Click Import. Each new chart gets the next chart number, and a message says how many patients were added and how many possible duplicates were skipped.

Importing needs permission to add patients to every chart, not only your caseload. A file can hold up to 500 rows.

Update charts from a file#

To correct many charts at once, such as new addresses after a mailing, member ids after a payer change or approval numbers that arrived by letter, download the current records, edit them in a spreadsheet and send the file back. Open Patients, open the actions menu and click Update from CSV.

1. Under Records, choose Patients, Coverages or Authorizations, then click Download current file. The file holds every chart you may export, with the ids the update needs. Keep its header row.
   • Patients: external id, names, date of birth, preferred name, sex, address, and the primary phone and email.
   • Coverages: one row per coverage with its coverage_id, payer, priority (primary, secondary or tertiary), plan name, member id, group number and effective dates.
   • Authorizations: one row per approval with its authorization_id, number, status (requested, pending, approved or denied), dates, and the visits and units approved.
2. Edit the cells you want to change. You can delete columns you are not changing; a column that is not in the file never changes anything.
3. Choose the edited file. Each row finds its chart by chart_number; when the chart number is blank, by external_id (the id another system uses for the patient); when both are blank, by last_name, first_name and date_of_birth when exactly one chart you can open has them. A row that matches no chart, or more than one, is listed as a problem. In a Patients file, a row found by its chart number can also set or change the external id, as long as no other chart has it.
4. Decide what a blank cell means with Blank cells clear values. Off, a blank cell keeps what the chart has. On, a blank cell clears an optional value, such as a preferred name, a plan name or a coverage end date. Required values, such as a name, a payer or a status, are never cleared.
5. Check the list of changes and any problems. A coverage row with a blank coverage_id adds a coverage, with the patient as subscriber. A coverage whose payer is not set up in Setup > Payers is refused, as are two coverages of the same priority on the same dates. An approval needs its number from the payer before it can be marked approved, unless it is provisional. New approvals are added on the chart, not from the file.
6. Click Update. Nothing changes while any row has a problem, so fix the file and choose it again.

Each kind of file needs the permission its chart screen needs: editing charts for patients, managing coverage for coverages and managing authorizations for authorizations, on the charts in your caseload or all charts. Downloading the current file needs permission to export patients. A file can hold up to 2,000 rows.

Patients under the age of majority#

A minor must have a legal guardian on file. When the date of birth you enter makes the patient younger than 18, the dialog asks for the guardian right away:

1. Enter the guardian's first and last name and their Relationship to the patient.
2. Leave Also the responsible party for bills checked if the guardian pays the bills.
3. Add the guardian's phone or email. For a young child this is often the only way to reach the family, and it counts as the contact method the chart needs.

The age of majority follows the state of the patient's default location: 18 in most states, 19 in Alabama and Nebraska, and 21 in Mississippi. If the location's state sets a higher age, NeatPractice asks for a guardian even when the patient is already 18. You can also add a guardian for an adult by checking Add a legal guardian.

Text message and email consent#

When you add a mobile number that can take texts, or an email address, you can record whether the patient agreed to reminders on it. Choose Consented or Opted out and how they told you (Told staff or Signed form).

Consent belongs to the number or address it was given for. If you later change the number or the address, the new one starts with no consent recorded, so record it again.

Social Security numbers#

The Social Security number field appears only if your clinic turned it on in patient settings. It is always optional. NeatPractice stores it encrypted and shows only the last four digits; people whose role allows it can click Show on the chart to see the full number, and each time they do is recorded.