Some workflows may benefit from using the Assigned Users feature rather than using Staging buttons from within the encounter. Assigned Users allow users to assign encounters to one individual at a time. However, assigning the encounter to a user does not prevent others from viewing or working in the encounter.
Enable Assigned Users
Assigned Users is an attribute on the Encounter Type. Select the Assign User option on the encounter type to enable the Assigned User feature. Keep in mind that the Assigned User will apply to every encounter Template utilized by the encounter type. This may not be ideal for all workflows, in which case utilizing stages within an encounter may be a better configuration option.
Assign User
When the encounter has been opened, the Assign button will display in the Current Encounter notification bar. Click the Assign button to assign the encounter.
The Assign dialogue box will display. Use the autocomplete search option in the Assign User field to search for the user to assign this encounter. A Priority option will display with a Normal priority by default. The Priority options are Normal and High. Once a User has been selected and the priority is set, simply click the Submit button to assign the encounter.
Quick Assign
At the bottom of the Assign dialogue box are quick assign buttons. At a minimum, users will see a quick button for “Creator:”. This button will show the name of the individual who created the encounter.
Additional quick assign buttons will display based on Active Clinical User contacts identified on the patient chart. In this example, William Hart has a Cardiology, Orthopedic Surgeon and Family Medicine provider listed as contacts on his chart. These providers are also active clinical system users, therefore, they display with a quick add button when assigning encounters. Clicking a quick assign button only requires one click to assign the encounter and the page will refresh.
Note: Supervisor contacts do not display as a quick assign button.
Assigned Users
Once the Assigned User has been set, the Current Encounter notification bar will display the current assigned user to the left of the Assign button. This alerts all users as to who has been assigned this encounter. Assigning an encounter does not prevent other staff from accessing or contributing to the encounter.
When a user has been assigned an encounter, the user will see an Assigned alert in the alerts bar. The number in red parentheses indicates the number of assigned encounters.
Click on the encounter name in the Options column or click the encounter Id to navigate directly to the encounter.
Closed encounters will no longer display on the assigned worklist.
The user autocomplete at the top of the Assigned page defaults to the logged in user. Users can change the user name in the autocomplete and change/view other users assigned encounters.
Assign User Autocomplete
By default, the Assign User autocomplete will allow searching for any user with clinical access to the chart.
The Assigned User autocomplete can be limited to search and display results for a specific department. This system setting supports limiting to ONE department. Enter the department name in the Current Value field to limit the autocomplete to search a specific department.
Note: The Assigned Users Department system setting applies to all encounter types that utilize the Assign User feature.
Unassign User
There is not an unassign user function. When the Assigned User feature has been initialized (by act of assigning the encounter), it is intended to require an assigned user until the workflow is complete or the encounter is closed. If there is a need to unassign a user, then using encounter staging might be a better workflow option rather than using the Assigned User feature.
Revision Tracking
A column for Assigned Users has been added to the encounter revisions table. This table is located in the Encounter Properties.
