See Overviews

The Clinics feature allows multiple locations to be run from one database while keeping locations separate for reporting and permissions.

Setting up Clinics

When setting up clinics, do the following:

• If using eServices, contact Open Dental support before enabling Clinics.
• Enable the clinics feature Show Features.
• Create each clinic in the Clinic List.
• Assign and restrict users to clinics in User Edit.
• Assign each patient a default clinic in the Edit Patient Information window.
• Review other clinic specific settings:
  • Operatories
  • Appointment Views
  • Clearinghouse Clinic Setup
  • Fee Override for Provider or Clinic
  • XCharge Setup for Clinics or PayConnect Setup for Clinics
  • Email Setup
  • Billing Defaults (clinic overrides).
  • Definitions: Clinic Specialties (useful for Clone patients).

Selecting a Clinic

In the Main Menu, click to view a dropdown of available clinics for the logged-on user.

To set the default clinic selected in the Main Menu when logging on, see Track Last Clinic by in Preferences.

The clinic selection determines the following:

• The look of the Appointments Module.
• The default clinic when adding new patients. When Headquarters is selected, Unassigned is the default. If adding a patient to an existing family, the clinic of the family is the default.
• The clinic for new appointments.
• The Lab Case status indicated in the Appointments Module. If Headquarters is the selected clinic, the status reflects all Lab Cases attached to scheduled appointments in any operatory, including those with no clinic assigned.
• The employees listed in the Time Clock area of the Manage Module and the clinic associated with clock events for the logged-in user.
• Which Alerts show.

Clinic Restrictions

In the User Edit window, you can set the default clinic for a user and restrict the user to specific clinics.

Setting a defult clinic, determines the clinic selection in the Main Menu when a user logs in if the Track Last Clinic By preference is set to User.

When a user is restricted to specific clinics, they face limitations in the following areas:

• Only clinics the user has access to are listed in the Main Menu, Clinics.
• Only patients in clinics the user has access to show when selecting patients.
  • Patients are associated to clinics when the clinic is their default or if they have any appointments in the clinic.
  • Users can be granted the Unrestricted Search permission to access all clinics when selecting patients.
• User can only see alerts for clinics they have access to (when the clinic is selected in the Main Menu).
• Billing
• Recurring Charges
• Charges
• Reports
• Sending Claims
• Time Card Management (if also have the time card manage permission)
• Time Clock (only show employees for their allowed clinic)
• Scheduling
• Fee Schedules

When providers are restricted to clinics, it may affect the available provider options in some areas (e.g., the only providers showing in lists are those who have access to a clinic). These areas include:

• Operatory Setup
• Edit Appointment window
• Edit Patient Information
• Adjustments
• Edit Claim Window
• Payment Plan
• Pay Splits
• Broken Appointment Procedure window
• Edit Procedure window
• Schedule Setup

To allow a provider access to all clinics, but still filter various provider lists throughout the program, set preferred clinics in Provider Setup, Clinics Tab.

Clinic Options

If a user is restricted to specific clinics, only clinics they are assigned to are accessible throughout the program.

In addition to individual clinics, the following options may be available:

• Unassigned: For patients, this indicates there is no clinic assigned to a patient in Edit Patient Information. For filter options (e.g., in Reports), this indicates items (e.g., procedures, payments, etc.) or patients not assigned to a clinic.
• none: Normally available in dropdown menus indicates there is no clinic assigned to an item (e.g., payments, procedures, adjustments)
• All: Normally available for filters (e.g., in Reports). Means all clinics the user has access to are included.
• Headquarters: is the default interface option (accessible via the Main Menu, Clinics) for users with no default clinic. In Schedule setup and Manage Time Cards, selecting Headquarters filters the results to employees not assigned a clinic.

Clinics on Appointments

• If an operatory has a clinic set, all appointments scheduled in that operatory are assigned to that clinic by default.
• If an operatory has no clinic, appointments in the operatory are assigned to the patient's clinic by default.

See Operatories for more details.

Clinics on Claims

To ensure claims are always credited to the correct clinic, follow these guidelines.

• Make sure each procedure is assigned to the correct clinic when it is completed. To make it easier, assign clinics to specific operatories, and place appointments in those operatories so the correct clinic is assigned by default.
• When the claim is created, it is automatically assigned a clinic based on the attached procedures, and this cannot be changed. If the wrong clinic gets attached to a claim, delete the claim, change all the procedures, then recreate the claim.

Other Clinic Logic

• Patient Payments: The default clinic for patient payments is determined by Default Clinic for patient payments set in Preferences.
• Claim Payments and Adjustments: Claim payments and adjustments default to the patient's clinic. If Unassigned, the default is None.
• Time Clock: Each time clock event is associated to a clinic. When clocking in, the clinic selected in the Main Menu is assigned to the event. Subsequent clock out events use the same clinic.

Troubleshooting

Also see: Multiple Locations

General Information:

• During HL7 import from eCW, clinics are not set for new patients.
• If Open Dental was used initially without the Clinic feature turned on, all patients that existed before enabling clinics have no clinic (ClinicNum of 0). A Clinic must be manually assigned to them. All new patients use the defaults.
• If Open Dental was used initially without the Clinic feature turned on, any previously scheduled appointments do not update to include a clinic. A clinic must be manually assigned to each appointment or the Update Provs on Future Appointments tool can be used to automatically assign Clinics (see Operatory Edit).

Patients with No Assigned Clinic:
To find patients with no assigned clinic, run the Database Maintenance tool and check results for PatientsNoClinicSet. If patients are found, then manually assign default clinics. If needed, contact Open Dental Support for a conversion service to associate clinics

Turning off Clinics:
Turning off Clinics (disabling the Clinics feature from Show Features), essentially ignores the clinics preferences that have been assigned throughout Open Dental and hides clinic information. Clinic information and preferences are not deleted. If the Clinics feature is re-enabled, the previous Clinic settings and information is visible or enabled once more.

This may affect third-party integrations. Before disabling clinics, practices may need to enable users access to all clinics.