The ‘Call Scheduler’ functionality has been enhanced to provide greater functionality to our users and further facilitate care management needs. This involves changes to the UI and previous workflows for scheduling and documenting patient interactions. Please review the following sections of this article to familiarize yourself with the new or updated features.
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Please note that the terminology used in the software has changed:

From the ThoroughCare dashboard, click the ‘Calendar’ option from the side-menu.

Within all the Calendar view types, the current day will always be highlighted with a light yellow overlay and U.S. holidays will be highlighted with light green.

The Calendar UI is separated into 15-minute intervals within the grid. This allows shorter interactions (15 minutes or less) to be easily viewed by users and facilitate scheduling brief interactions. Each interval contains an alternating color fill to make it easier for users to view and find scheduled interactions.

The Calendar ‘Month’ view will show all scheduled interactions for the selected month, displaying the Start Time and the Patient Name associated with each interaction.

NOTE: In order to enhance performance and readability, the ‘Month’ view is now limited to 1 user schedule at a time.

If a date on the ‘Month’ view contains more than (7) patient interactions, a ‘View More ↓’ button will populate.

When clicked, this button will immediately navigate the user to that date’s ‘Week’ view where all the scheduled items will be displayed in a more readable and interactive format.

The ‘Week’ view for the Calendar will show all scheduled interactions for the selected week.

Interactions scheduled for 15 minutes or less will display the Start Time and Patient Name associated with it, while interactions scheduled for 30 minutes or more will display the Start Time, Patient Name, Purpose, DOB, and Preferred Phone (if applicable).

The ‘Day’ view for the Calendar will show all scheduled interactions for the selected day, displaying the Start Time, End Time, Patient Name, Purpose associated with each interaction, DOB, and Preferred Phone (if applicable).

The Calendar contains color coding functionality using the colors shown below to clearly represent the status of each scheduled interaction.

Users can schedule interactions by clicking anywhere into the Calendar UI grid which will bring up the ‘Schedule Interaction’ modal.

For the ‘Week’ view, if multiple items are scheduled for the same time slot then the UI will display an icon that when clicked will show the additional interactions through a pop-up on the Calendar UI.

If there are more interactions scheduled with overlapping time ranges than the Calendar UI can show, the additional interactions will be grouped under a '+(#)' icon that is shown next to the rightmost item in the time slot. The (#) in the icon represents the number of additional scheduled items that conflict.

When the '+(#)' icon is clicked, all additional scheduled items are displayed in a pop-up modal where users may interact with the items within the modal.

Once an interaction is scheduled, users can edit the details of the interaction as necessary. To do so, a user can navigate to the Calendar UI and click on the interaction they would like to edit. This will open up the ‘Document Interaction’ modal that will be covered more in-depth in the following section of this article.

Within this modal, users may edit the Time and Date of the interaction, along with who the interaction is Assigned to, the Interaction Type, the Purpose, or the Notes entered for it. Click the ‘Save’ button when finished for the edits to take effect.
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As shown in the previous section, a user may click on a scheduled interaction within the Calendar UI to open up the ‘Document Interaction’ modal where users may document an Outcome to complete the interaction.

Users may also edit other information for this interaction through the ‘Document Interaction’ modal. Users must click the ‘Save’ button to have any changes apply.

The following items below describe functionality reserved for admin users only:

If your practice is enabled for ‘Video’ communications, then users will be able to schedule video interactions with their patients through the Calendar.

To schedule such interactions for enabled practices, go to the Calendar and create an interaction. Select the ‘Video’ option for the ‘Type’ field, fill out the rest of the required fields, and click the ‘Save’ button to populate the appointment on the Calendar.

Once the appointment is scheduled, a user can open the appointment details from the Calendar or patient chart and click the ‘Launch Video’ button at the top of the ‘Document Interaction’ modal.

Once the ‘Launch Video’ button is pressed, the video appointment will start and be displayed through a mini-window in the corner of the ThoroughCare application. Users may click to expand the window.

Patients will receive a text and email (depending on the information entered into their patient chart) with a link that will connect them to the video appointment with their care manager.

Peer Calendaring is available ONLY in the ‘Day’ and ‘Week’ view for Calendar.

To view the calendars of other users within the practice, navigate to the ‘Show Schedules For’ dropdown while either the ‘Day’ or ‘Week’ view is selected.

For the ‘Day’ view, up to 4 users can be selected at once. Each user’s schedule will appear within their own column on the Calendar.

For the ‘Week’ view, up to 8 users can be selected at once. Each user’s schedule will appear within their own column on the Calendar.

While the ‘Month’ view can’t be used for Peer Calendaring, the user may still utilize the ‘Show Schedules For’ dropdown to ONLY view another user’s schedule. When Peer Calendaring is being used in the ‘Day’ or ‘Week’ view, the button for the ‘Month’ view will be disabled with a tooltip.

Admin users can configure custom Interaction Types and Outcome Statuses to meet their specific practice needs when utilizing the Calendar.

To find these sections, locate the ‘Management’ options in the side-menu and first select ‘Interaction Types’.

By default, the global Interaction Types will be displayed in the configuration table. Global values cannot be edited and will display a tooltip when hovering your mouse over the ‘Edit’ button.

If an ‘Interaction Type’ is not associated with an active ‘Outcome Statuses’, then it can be disabled by clicking the ‘Disable’ button next to the record under the ‘Actions’ columns.

A browser confirmation will be displayed and if the user clicks to confirm their choice then the record will become disabled. Click the ‘Enable’ button to return the record to an active state.

If the ‘Interaction Type’ that a user is trying to disable is associated with an active ‘Outcome Status’, then after clicking to continue past the browser confirmation, the user will receive a modal message stating that the disable action cannot occur.

To create your own ‘Interaction Type’, users can click the ‘+ Add Interaction Type’ button located in the top-right corner of the configuration section.

Once clicked, the ‘Add Interaction Type’ modal will be displayed where users can first enter the name for their new record.

Next, users can select to associate the ‘Interaction Type’ to either the ‘Call Purpose’ list or to 'N/A' if they do not want the 'Interaction Type' associated to the 'Call Purpose' list.

If an ‘Interaction Type’ is set to the ‘Call Purpose’ list then a user will be able to select from the list of Call Purposes for the ‘Purpose’ field when scheduling and documenting on patient interactions.

If an ‘Interaction Type’ is set to the ‘N/A' then the 'Purpose' field will not be displayed when scheduling or documenting with that 'Interaction Type' selected

Finally, the user can select which products the ‘Interaction Type’ should be associated with, whether it is only one, multiple, or all.

This affects the 'Outcome Statuses’ that can be associated to an ‘Interaction Type’ as the two types of records must share overlapping product associations in order for the two records to be connected to each other through the ‘Outcome Status’ section. This will be further explained in the next section.

When ready, the user can click the ‘Save’ button and the new record will be added to the table. If all available products were selected then ‘All’ will show instead of all individual products selected under the ‘Product’ column of the table.

Custom records can also be copied across all practices in a practice group by clicking the ‘Copy to All’ button.

The ‘Interaction Types’ can be reordered in the table by either clicking the blue up or down arrows next to each record or by dragging and dropping the record to the desired location. The ordering will affect how the records are displayed in respective dropdown lists.

Users can also use the ‘Sort A-Z’ button to reorder the records alphabetically.

The ‘Outcome Statuses’ section can be found for Admin users under the navigation link for ‘Interaction Types’ under the Management set of options.

While similar to the table for ‘Interaction Types’, the table for ‘Outcome Statuses’ has unique functionalities due to how these records interact with ‘Interaction Types’ in the software.

By default, the global ‘Outcome Statuses’ will be displayed in the configuration table. Global values cannot be edited and will display a tooltip when hovering your mouse over the ‘Edit’ button. However they can be disabled or enabled.

Under the ‘Outcome’ column, each Outcome Status will be marked as either representing a ‘Successful’ or an ‘Attempted’ outcome.

On the Calendar UI, utilizing an Outcome Status marked as ‘Successful’ will color code an interaction as green while using one marked as ‘Attempted’ will mark the interaction with a yellow color.

The ‘Interaction Type(s)’ column shows which ‘Interaction Types’ the selected ‘Outcome Status’ is tied to. When those listed ‘Interaction Types’ are used for scheduling or documenting an interaction, the ‘Outcome Statuses’ associated with them will appear as options to select from under the ‘Outcome’ field dropdown for the relevant Calendar modals.

To create a custom ‘Outcome Status’, select the ‘+Add Outcome Status’ button in the top-right corner under the username.

This will open the ‘Add Outcome Status’ modal where users can first enter in a name for their custom record.

Then users can select how this ‘Outcome Status’ should be coded; either as a ‘Successful’ outcome or an ‘Attempted’ one.

Users may then select which products to associate this record with, whether it is only one, multiple, or all.

Finally, the user can select which ‘Interaction Types’ this ‘Outcome Status’ will be displayed for when documenting scheduled interactions through the relevant Calendar modals.

When ready, the user can click the ‘Save’ button in the modal to add the new ‘Outcome Status’ to the section table.

Custom records can also be copied across all practices in a practice group by clicking the ‘Copy to All’ button.

The ‘Outcome Statuses’ can be reordered in the table by either clicking the blue up or down arrows next to each record or by dragging and dropping the record to the desired location. The ordering will affect how the records are displayed in respective dropdown lists.

Users can also use the ‘Sort A-Z’ button to reorder the records alphabetically.

The new Calendar components for scheduling and documenting interactions can also be accessed from the Patient Chart. One way is to access it through the ‘Calendar’ button in the top-right corner of the chart.

Clicking on the button will display the ‘Patient Interaction Log’ which allows users to schedule, document an already scheduled interaction, or start documentation on an interaction that was not previously scheduled.

To schedule a new interaction for the patient whose chart you are viewing, select the date and time for the interaction to take place and then click the ‘Schedule’ button.

The scheduled interaction will then populate on the table below. To document on the scheduled interaction, users can click the ‘Complete’ button in the actions column.

After clicking on the ‘Complete’ button, the details of the interaction will already be filled in within the modal and the ‘Outcome’ field will need to be set with an available Outcome Status. Once done, the user may click the ‘Save’ button to complete documentation.

If the user wishes to document a patient interaction that wasn’t previously scheduled, they can click on the ‘Document Interaction’ button location within the modal.

This will bring up the ‘Document Interaction’ modal with only the patient information filled in and the current time will be used for the ‘Start’ field. The ‘End’ field will default to 30 minutes from the start-time and can be adjusted as necessary.

The remaining fields can be completed and then slick the ‘Save’ button to save the interaction to the Patient Chart through the ‘Patient Interaction Log’ modal. This will also populate the documented interaction on the Calendar UI as well.

Underneath the ‘Care Management’ tab, users can also bring up the ‘Patient Interaction Log’ modal through the ‘Next Follow Up Interaction’ button next to the time-logger.

If a patient interaction has already been scheduled, then clicking on the button will bring up the ‘Document Interaction’ modal with the interaction information prefilled.

If there were no upcoming patient interaction scheduled, then the information within ‘Document Interaction’ will be blank outside of the patient information, user assigned, the 'Type' will default to 'Outbound Call' and the length of the interaction defaulted to 30 minutes.

The ‘Call Status’ button can also be used to quickly document a patient interaction. However, this workflow will always use the ‘Outbound Call’ interaction type and set the current user as the default user assigned.

The date, time, purpose, outcome, and call notes can then be entered and saved. This interaction will then populate into the ‘Patient Interaction Log’ and into the Calendar.

Users can document on patient interactions from program worklists by selecting the ‘Phone’ icon under the ‘Call Status’ column for any patient record.

When selected, the ‘Document Patient Call Status’ will be displayed. With similar functionality to the ‘Phone’ icon when documenting from the patient chart, ‘Outbound Calls’ are already selected by default as the ‘Interaction Type’ and can’t be changed or edited. The user who is documenting will be considered the user ‘Assigned’ to this interaction.

The user is able to enter the date, time, purpose, outcome, and any call notes into the modal. If they click save then this interaction will populate into the ‘Patient Interaction Log’ and into the Calendar.

The phone icon on the worklist for that patient will also color code based on the outcome selected for the interaction.

Along with patient interactions, events can also be scheduled from the Calendar. Users should click on the ‘+ Event’ button to bring up the ‘Create Custom Event’ modal.

Once a user fills out the required information and hits ‘Save’, the event will then populate onto the Calendar UI and will be color coded as BROWN.

A report of calls marked as ‘Pending’ can be generated by a user through the Reports section.

Click on the username in the upper-right corner of the screen.

Then click on ‘Reports’ in the dropdown that appears.

Proceed to the dropdown box under ‘Report Type’ and select the ‘Missed Call’ option. Then click the ‘View’ button.

A list of ‘Pending’ calls associated with the user will be displayed. By default, any call over 60 minutes since its scheduled end time will be shown.

Date, time, call purpose, and any notes related to the call will be listed and the most outstanding calls will be shown first as the default view.

The report can be sorted by date, patient, call purpose or note by clicking on the column headers or the sort icons next to them.

A user can also use the search bar to find information within any of the data fields.

The date and time of the call can be clicked to bring up the ‘Log / Call Interaction’ modal where the call’s status can be updated.

Finally, clicking on a hyperlinked patient name will send a user to the corresponding patient chart.

To access other helpful ThoroughCare articles in the Knowledge Base or to get help from the ThoroughCare Support team members, click the ‘i’ icon in the top right corner of the software next to the username and use the appropriate link!