What is Bp Comms?

Quick Reference Guide

Bp Comms is an extensive practice-patient communications feature set of Bp Premier that allows you to:

  • Send mail-merged appointment reminders, clinical reminders, health awareness communications (from a database search), and clinical communications for following up results to SMS or Best Health App.
  • Send electronic prescription tokens via SMS or Best Health App.
  • Send one-off messages to single patients from the patient record, inboxes, and appointment book.
  • Create templates for SMS and App messages populated at send time with information from the database, and craft custom replies for automatic appointment confirmation.
  • Automatically and manually record Contact Notes for an auditable history of communications with patients by phone, letter, and SMS.

NOTE  Appointment reminders are not available to sites with a legacy, clinical-only Bp Premier licence.

Regardless of whether messages are sent to SMS or App, all messages use the same shared Bp Comms credits.

Enable Bp Comms

Contact sales@bpsoftware.net to enable Bp Comms at your practice.

Set up Bp Comms

Once Bp Comms has been enabled, setting up Bp Comms involves:

  1. Adding Bp Comms credit and setting your threshold warnings.
  2. Setting practice preferences for sending to SMS or App.
  3. Setting up Bp Comms templates.
  4. Enrolling patients and recording patient consent to receive messages.

Then you're ready to start sending messages!

Top up Bp Comms credit

A Bp Comms credit code contains a dollar amount that can be used for sending Best Health App and SMS messages, as well as electronic prescription tokens. Contact Best Practice Software Sales to obtain a Bp Comms credit code. You may have also received Bp Comms credit as part of a Best Health App Welcome Pack.

How Much Bp Comms Credit Do I Have?

The balance of your Bp Comms credit is often displayed when you send a Bp Comms message. This information is located at the bottom of the screen and displays how many SMS or App messages you could send using your remaining credit. You can also view your available credit by navigating to Setup > Configuration > Bp Comms.

Remaining Bp Comms Credit is displayed on the bottom of the screen.

Top up Bp Comms Credit

If a user has permission to access Configuration, he or she can top up the Bp Comms credit at any time.

  1. Contact Best Practice Software Sales to obtain a Bp Comms credit code.
  2. Go to Setup > Configuration and select the Bp Comms tab.
  3. Under Bp Comms credits, enter the code you received into Enter code to top up credit and click Validate. Bp Premier will update the Credits Remaining and Unused messages values.

    4. Top up Bp Comms credits

  4. Click Validate. The Credits Remaining value should be increased by the top-up amount. It will also indicate how many SMS or Best Health App messages you can send with your remaining credits.

Bp Comms Credit Warnings and Messages

Configurable warning prompts and messages are available to ensure no interruptions occur to Bp Comms functionality as a result of lack of credit.

Bp Comms Warning Prompt

This prompt can be set up to remind you to contact Best Practice Software Sales to purchase additional credit. If the available Bp Comms message credit falls below the configured limit a single warning prompt is displayed whenever you enter a screen that can send a Bp Comms message. To configure the Bp Comms warning prompt:

  1. Navigate to Setup > Configuration and select the Bp Comms tab.
  2. Check the Display a warning prompt when remaining messages fall below checkbox.

    3. Bp Comms Warning Prompt Configuration

  3. Enter how many messages you want remaining before you start receiving the warning prompt.
  4. Select either App or SMS from the drop down list. Best Practice Software recommends selecting the BpComms method you use the most.
  5. Click Save.

A prompt similar to below will display when your Bp Comms credit falls below the configured limit.

Low BpComms Credit Warning

Bp Comms Warning Message

The Bp Comms warning message will send an internal Bp Premier message to the selected user when the available message credit falls below the configured limit. This warning method is useful when automated Bp Comms are configured as there is no window or screen to display a warning prompt. To configure the Bp Comms warning message:

  1. Navigate to Setup > Configuration and select the Bp Comms tab.
  2. Check the Send a message to a user when remaining messages fall below checkbox.

    3. Bp Comms Warning Prompt Configuration

  3. Enter how many messages you want remaining before you start receiving the warning message. Best Practice Software recommend that this value be set higher than the warning prompt, so that the nominated user has time to order a new credit key before other users are warned about low credit.
  4. Select either App, SMS, SMS eScripts or App eScripts from the drop down list. Best Practice Software recommends selecting the BpComms method you use the most.
  5. Select the user who you want to receive the message in the Low credit warning message recipient drop down list.
  6. Click Save.

A message similar to below will be received when your Bp Comms credit falls below the configured limit.

Low Bp Comms Credit Message

Select consent and enrolment settings

NOTE  These settings are not required if Bp Comms is only used for sending electronic prescriptions at your practice.

Use the options under Allow the following message types: to define which types of messages your practice can send with Bp Comms.

Use the options under Patient SMS: to determine the workflow for enroling patients for SMS.

  • If Send patient SMS when enabling and Mobile number verification is required are both unticked, the patient receives no enrolment message, no patient action is required, and SMS enrolment is complete.
  • If Send patient SMS when enabling is ticked, the patient will receive an enrolment SMS message but no further action is required. SMS enrolment is complete.
  • If Mobile number verification is required is ticked, the Verification Required window will appear, summarising the patient's Bp Comms consent. Click Send to send a validation code to the patient's mobile phone, and enter the code into the box that appears. Bp Premier will validate the code and SMS enrolment is complete.

For more information about Bp Comms consent, see Understanding Bp Comms Consent.

Set practice preferences

Preferred practice contact method

The Preferred Practice contact method setting is used when sending Bp Comms via mail merge such as Clinical Reminders or clinical-related communications from Follow up Inbox. You can choose SMS or App as your preferred method of sending Bp Comms, if your practice has set up both.

  1. Select Setup > Configuration from the main menu.
  2. Select the Bp Comms tab.
  3. In the Preferred Practice contact method section, select 'App' or 'SMS' from the Primary dropdown menu.

  4. If you have more than one Bp Comms method enabled, select it from the Secondary dropdown menu.
  5. Click Save.

When you run a mail merge or send a single message from a Bp Premier function, the message will be sent by the default method selected here. If a patient is not set up to use either App or SMS, the communication will be sent via Letter.

This below table gives examples of how patient communication will be sent given various setups in Preferred Practice contact method. In the below scenarios it is assumed that the patient has consented to receive all types of communication via Bp Comms.

Preferred Practice Contact Method

Patient Enrolled/Enabled

Default method

Primary: App, Secondary: SMS

App, SMS

App

Primary: App, Secondary: SMS

SMS

SMS

Primary: SMS, Secondary: App

App, SMS

SMS

Primary: SMS, Secondary: App

App

App

Primary: SMS, Secondary: App

None

Letter

Force marking results as Contacted

As of Saffron SP2, Force marking results as contacted indicates whether or not patients are automatically marked as contacted if a message is sent to them via the Follow-up Inbox.

Force marking results as contacted is ticked by default. Untick Force marking results as contacted to choose whether or not a patient is marked as contacted at a more granular level in the Follow-up Inbox. See Contact patients from the Follow-up Inbox for more information.

 

Set up templates

Create a template

NOTE  Templates are not required for sending electronic prescriptions.

You can create as many message templates as you need.

  1. Select Setup > Configuration from the main Bp Premier screen. Select the Templates icon.

    2. Bp Comms template configuration

  2. Click Add on the right. The Add Bp Comms Template screen will appear.

    3. Add BpComms Template

  3. Enter a Name for the template and select the Type of template from the dropdown.

    4. The template type determines the functions in Bp Premier from which the template can be selected. For example, templates of type 'Result' are intended for selection when sending messages from the Inbox and Follow up Inbox screen, because those messages will relate to patient investigation results.

  4. Type your template text into the text box.
  5. The fields on the right hand side will be substituted with information when the reminder is sent. Double-click on a field to insert the field where the cursor is positioned in the template text.
  6. Select Set as default template for this template type to automatically select this template when a new message of this type is created. You can change the template before sending a message.
  7. Tick Template text can be edited before sending to allow a user to modify the template text before sending. If this option is not ticked, users will not be able to modify the message text from the template.

    8. NOTE  Your practice should carefully consider which templates are editable by users before sending. Templates should align with your practice's guidelines for patient-practice communications. If you allow editing, you cannot guarantee that the message will conform to those guidelines. You may wish to allow editing only for messages of type 'Patient record', for example, where tailored messages may be required.

  8. If you are creating a new 'Appointment' template, tick Appointment template expects a reply if the patient is expected to reply and update the appointment book.
  9. Click Preview to view how the text will appear on a mobile device. If the message looks OK, click Close and Save to save the template.

Set up reply keywords

You can specify which keywords in a patient reply to an appointment reminder will automatically update the appointment book. This functionality is relevant for SMS replies only; Best Health App message reply text is not configurable.

  1. From the main screen, select Setup > Configuration > Appt Reminders tab.

    2. Appointment Reminders Configuration

  2. Both of the checkboxes under Appointment attendance automation must be ticked to enable appointment updates by SMS reply.
  3. Click Configure appointment attendance replies to open the Automatic Confirmation Options window.

    4. Automatic confirmation options

  4. Tick Confirm or decline appointment when message begins with a keyword.
  5. Tick Confirm or decline appointment when message contains a keyword if you want a keyword to be accepted if it appears anywhere in the reply.

    6. These two options don't apply to the default keywords 'Yes' and 'No'. These keywords will indicate a confirm or decline when they are the only words in the reply message, even if they start or are contained in the reply.

    For example, a reply 'Yes I will be there' will not trigger an appointment confirmation, nor would 'Sorry no' trigger a declined attendance.

  6. Click Add next to the Confirm list of keywords. Type a new keyword and click OK to add the keyword to the list. Keywords are limited to 20 characters at most.
  7. Add as may Confirm and Decline keywords as you need.

    8. Keywords are only accepted as an exact match of whole words, even if you tick Confirm or decline appointment when message contains a keyword. For example, if you accept the keyword 'No', words like 'not' or 'nope' will not automatically update the appointment book. If a patient includes both Confirm and Decline keywords in a reply, the appointment will not be updated.

  8. Click Ok to save your keywords and return to the Configuration window.

 

Enrol patients and record consent

You must record a patient's consent before they can receive Bp Comms messages from your practice.

Recorded consent is not required to send electronic prescriptions, as verbal consent will be provided by the patient at the time of sending.

  1. Search for the patient using any of the patient search methods: File > Open Patient, View > Patient, or press F2.
  2. Click View details to open the Patient details screen.
  3. Click Comms Consent on the right-hand side of the screen.

  4. The Comms Consent window will appear.

    5. Set consent

    Bp Comms Consent Screen

  5. Under Consent Options, tick the Comms message types that the patient consents to receive. Ticking a message type will enable other buttons in this window.
  6. If you need to store a signed consent form for the patient, click Open Bulk Document Import to scan and import the signed consent form into Bp Premier.

    7. NOTE  A user will need permission to access the Bulk Document Import tool. See Import bulk clinical documents

  7. Click Link to signed consent. The Select signed consent window will appear.

    8. Select Signed Consent screen

  8. Tick the form you want to link to as the most recent and correct consent and click Select to return to the Comms Consent window.
  1. Under Consent Status, you can change the Mobile Phone number.

    2. The number must be in the Australian format of ‘0400 000 000’ (with or without spaces). The number must not have a ‘+’ or ‘61’ prefix. Incorrectly formatted numbers will be rejected by the message provider service and will not be delivered.

  2. Click Enable to verify the patient's mobile number. The action required by the patient will depend on your Consent/Enrolment settings in Setup > Configuration: 
    • If Send patient SMS when enabling and Mobile number verification is required are both unticked, the patient receives no enrolment message, no patient action is required, and SMS enrolment is complete.
    • If Send patient SMS when enabling is ticked, the patient will receive an enrolment SMS message but no further action is required. SMS enrolment is complete.
    • If Mobile number verification is required is ticked, the Verification Required window will appear, summarising the patient's Bp Comms consent. Click Send to send a validation code to the patient's mobile phone, and enter the code into the box that appears. Bp Premier will validate the code and SMS enrolment is complete.

      • NOTE  Best Practice Software recommend mobile number verification to ensure that the intended patient receives messages from your practice.

      Enrolment Verification Code

  3. Click Save.

Send Bp Comms messages

You can mail merge and send a variety of clinical and management message types in bulk to patients, and also send one-off messages to single patients from many functions in Bp Premier.

 

Appointment Reminders

Send Bp Comms appointment reminders

NOTE  Appointment reminders are not available to sites with a clinical-only licence.

  1. From the appointment book, select Utilities > Send Appointment Reminders. The Appointment Reminders screen will appear.

    2. Appointment Reminders from Appointment Book

  2. Complete the fields on the left hand side to generate a list of applicable appointments:

    3. Field

    Description

    By date span

    Select a default period to search for appointments.

    By date range

    Specify a date range to search for appointments.

    Search appointments by time between

    Select only appointments between the specified times.

    Exclude appointments that already have a reminder sent

    Do not select appointments that have been included in previous appointment reminder sendouts.

    Excluding appointments made within the last n days

    Do not select appointments if booked in the prior specified number of days.

    Include doctors' appointments

    Select appointments with the specified doctors.

    Include appointment types

    Select appointments of the specified types.

    Include locations

    Select appointments at the specified locations.

    Appointments that meet the criteria will appear on the right hand side of the screen.

  3. Check or uncheck the SMS and App options in the Allow sending via checkboxes to disable or enable a Bp Comms method for this batch. This will change the list of appointment reminders that will be sent, either removing them from the list or changing the Send Via column to SMS or App depending upon what the patient has enrolled with.
  4. Select a Template appropriate for this batch of appointment reminders.

    5. Select Appointment Reminder template

  5. The Edit button will be disabled if the template is not configured to allow editing before sending. If editing is allowed for this template, click the Edit button and make any required changes to the message text before sending.
  6. In the Select which appointments to send reminders for list, untick any appointments you do not want included in the reminder sendout.
  7. Click Send all n Reminders at the bottom right. If there are no duplicate reminders, the messages will be sent. Appointments will be updated with a green tick in the list if a reminder was sent.

    8. Send Appointment Reminders

Bp Premier will send all messages and deduct the credit from your Bp Comms credit.

Duplicate Reminders

Where a patient has multiple appointments in the selected range or there are multiple patients who have the same mobile phone number, a Duplicate Appointment Reminders screen will appear. This screen shows each appointment that would generate a duplicate message.

Duplicate appointment reminders

Untick the appointments that you don't want messages sent for and click the Send Reminders button.

 

Clinical Reminders

Clinical reminders are sent in two steps: generate the list of patients with reminders, and choose the reminder method (SMS, Best Health App or letter, or output to print, file, or label).

Select patients for reminders

  1. Select Clinical > Reminders or click the envelope icon Best Practice Premier Reminder List Icon on the main screen of Bp Premier. The Reminders screen will appear.

    2. Reminders screen

    This screen displays reminders that have not yet been sent. If a reminder is 'marked as sent' from anywhere in Bp Premier, the reminder will not be displayed on this screen.

    Clinically significant reminders are indicated in the Action column.

  2. Click Select Patients to display the Select patients for reminders screen.

    3. Select patients for reminders

  3. Select from the fields to search for patients with reminders to send:

    4. Filter

    Action

    Clinically significant only

    Filters the Reminder reasons to only show those marked as Clinically significant.

    Filter by type

    Filters the Reminder reasons to only show those that are linked to the selected type. Reminder types can be created in Setup > Configuration > Reminders.

    Reason

    Select one or more reminder reasons to send, or click Select all.

    Due between / and

    Select patients with reminders due between the dates only.

    Select users

    Select patients assigned a reminder by the selected doctors only.

    Location

    Select reminders sent from the selected locations only.

    Include overdue reminders

    Include patients with reminders that are overdue in the selected time period.

    Include inactive patients

    Include patients marked as inactive in their patient demographic.

  4. Click Ok to return to the Reminders screen. The following actions are available using the top buttons:
    • To remove a single reminder, select the reminder and click Remove from list. The Reminder in the patient record will be unaffected.
    • To delete a reminder from the list and the patient record, select the reminder and click Delete Reminder. The Reminder will be deleted from the patient's record.
    • To view the appointments for a patient (to see if a future appointment might already be booked), click View appointments.

You can now send reminders using a suitable method for each patient.

Send reminders

  1. From the Reminders screen, click Send reminders to open the Send reminders window.

    2. Send reminders

    Bp Premier will check if each patient has consented to receive SMS or Best Health App messages of type 'Clinical reminder'. Patients who have consented and enrolled will be added to the SMS or App total; patients who have not consented will be added to the Letter total.

  2. In the Bp Comms tab, select the clinical reminder template you want to use.

    3. Select clinical reminder SMS template

  3. If there are patients who will receive a letter reminder, select the Letter tab and select the clinical reminder letter template to use.

    4. Select clinical reminder letter template

  4. Tick the Update options to apply:
    • Mark as sent marks the reminder on the patient's record as 'Sent'. This option is selected by default for Mail Merge options (Letter, SMS, App) and cannot be changed. If you select to send by an Alternative output (Print, Label, File), Mark as sent can be edited.
    • Save a copy in each patient's record places a copy of the reminder letter or message into the Correspondence Out section of the patient's record. The name of a letter will be ‘Reminder letter’.
    • Add a new reminder for those marked as auto-update creates a new reminder in patient records where the reminder is configured to auto-update.
    • Combine reminders for the same patient combines multiple reminders in the Reminders list intended for the same patient into a single SMS or Best Health App message or reminder letter. The resulting message may exceed the character limit and require multiple credits to send.

    5. Reminder update options

  5. The right side of the Send reminders window will show a summary of the message methods and the SMS credits available.

    6. Send Reminders output

  6. Click Send. Bp Premier will confirm that you want to send the selected reminders.

    7. Mail Merge confirm

  7. Click Yes to confirm. Bp Premier will send the messages and Deduct message credits from your Bp Comms credit.

Sending reminders is complete.

Follow up sent reminders

When sending mail merge clinical reminders, all included reminders will be marked as sent. If you want to review the reminders that have been marked as sent, and action or remark those reminders, you can do this from the Follow Up Reminders window. Select View > Follow up reminders from the Reminders window.

See Follow up sent reminders for more information.

 

Clinical Communications

You can send communications to patients in two ways from the Followup Inbox, depending on how your practice handles clinical reminders: 

  • Send single SMS or Best Health App messages to patients, or contact a patient and record a contact note
  • Send messages in bulk by SMS, Best Health App and letter by running a mail merge.

Send bulk clinical communications with a mail merge

  1. From the main screen, select Clinical > Follow up Inbox.
  2. Use the Filter by... and Checked by options to show only those results that you want to send in bulk, to make it easy to visualise what will be sent. You can also action any results now that you do not want to send in bulk.
  3. Select File > Mail Merge to open the Follow up Inbox - Mail Merge window.

    4. Bp Premier will check if each patient has consented to receive SMS or Best Health App messages of type 'Clinical Communication'. Patients who have consented and enrolled will be added to the SMS or App total; patients who have not consented will be added to the Letter total.

  4. In the Bp Comms tab, select the clinical communication template you want to use.

    5. Select clinical communication template

  5. If some patients will receive a letter, select the Letter tab and select the clinical communication letter template to use.

    6. Select clinical communication letter template

  6. Set the Update options on the right hand side to apply.

    7. If you filtered the list on the Follow up Inbox screen, the filters will be already set correctly. If not, filter the final list to be included in the list of results:

    • Checked by doctor filters the list to results checked only by the selected provider.
    • Reports checked from filters the list to reports checked between the selected dates.
    • Include determines the results to include based on the assigned Action. For example, you could untick all boxes except Urgent appointment to follow up urgent results by SMS or Best Health App.

      • NOTE  Make sure the options you select here follow your practice's procedures for following up results.

    • Mark as contacted will mark each investigation result as contacted and remove the result from the Follow up Inbox.
    • Mark Result as given to patient will indicate that the patient has been given the result. The result in the patient’s file will be updated to indicate a status of ‘Given’ and the date.

      • As of Saffron SP2, depending on how Bp Comms is configured at your practice, you can untick both Mark as contacted and Mark result as given to patient. In the Follow up Inbox, the report status will change to Sent, and the contact attempt will be counted in the Attempts column.

      See Marking results as contacted and the Follow up Inbox for more information.

    • Save a copy in each patient's record places a copy of the clinical communication into the Correspondence Out section of the patient's record.

  7.  Click Send from the Mail Merge window. Bp Premier will confirm that you want to send the selected clinical communications.

    Clinical communication Mail Merge confirm

  8. Click Yes to confirm. Bp Premier will send the messages and deduct the total Bp Comms credits.

Sending results follow up communications is complete.

 

Health Awareness Communications

Health awareness communications are sent in two steps: generate the list of applicable patients from a database search, and choose the communication method (SMS, Best Health App or letter).

More information on health awareness communications and patient opt-out is available from Frequently asked questions about Bp Comms.

Select patients for communications

Press Ctrl+S or select Utilities > Search from the main screen to run a database search, using criteria to select patients that you want included in the communications. For example, you may want to search for all patients with diabetes for a health awareness campaign, or search for all patients with asthma, or who are 65 years old or over.

Running a search for Bp Comms is exactly the same as any other database search. See Searching the database for more information.

The example below shows a search by Conditions for patients with 'Diabetes' in past history.

Diabetes Search

Send communications

  1. After you have generated a list of patients from a database search, select File > Mail Merge. The Mail merge screen appears.

    2. Health Awareness Communications

    Bp Premier will check if each patient has consented to receive SMS or Best Health App messages of type 'Health Awareness'. Patients who have consented and enrolled will be added to the SMS or App total; patients who have not consented will be added to the Letter total.

  2. In the Bp Comms tab, select the health awareness SMS template you want to use. See Title for more information.

    3. Select health awareness SMS template

  3. If there are patients who will receive a letter, select the Letter tab and select the health awareness letter template to use.

    4. Select health awareness letter template

  4. Tick the Update options to apply:
    • Save a copy in each patient's record places a copy of the health awareness communication into the Correspondence Out section of each patient's record.
    • Create a reminder for each patient adds a new reminder to each patient in the search results. The reminder will be marked as 'Sent' so you can monitor responses from the patient from the Follow up reminders screen. If you tick this option, you cannot include any reminder reason fields in the message sent.
  5. Click Select Reminder to choose the reminder.

    6. Health awareness update options

  6. If you are not creating reminders from this communication, enter text in the Reason for this communication text area. This text will not be included in the message or letter to the patient, but allows the contact note that is automatically created to be identified.

    7. Reason for health awareness communication

  7. If you are not creating a reminder, or are creating a reminder for 'any doctor', select a user from the Show communication as sent from dropdown. This dropdown shows only providers, unless Include all users is ticked.

    8. Show communication as sent from identifies who a communication is being sent on behalf of, and appears in the contact note that is created. This information is not included in the message or letter.

  8. Click Send from the Mail Merge window. Bp Premier will confirm that you want to send the selected health awareness messages.

    Health Awareness Mail Merge confirm

  9. Click Yes to confirm. Bp Premier will send the messages and deduct the total of Bp Comms credits.

Sending reminders is complete.

Send messages to a single patient

Send a single appointment reminder

To send a patient a single Bp Comms reminder, the patient must have an appointment in the appointment book.

  1. Open the appointment book. Select the patient's appointment and click Utilities > Send message from the menu. The Send Message screen will appear.

    2. Send single SMS

  2. Select a Template other than the default if you need to. The message box will be populated with the selected template and field information. You can edit the message if required.
  3. Click Send.

Send a single message

  1. From the main screen, select Clinical > Follow up Inbox.

    2. Followup Inbox

  2. Use the Filter by... and Checked by options to show only those results you want to work with. For example, if you are a nurse, you might filter on an action of 'Nurse to Advise', or 'All unactioned', so that you are only working with applicable reminders.
  3. The leftmost column contains an icon that indicates one of: 
    • the patient's preferred contact method
    • the contact method of the last contact note for this reminder, if one exists.

    The legend along the bottom of the screen explains the different icons and colours that can apply.

  4. If the icon colour indicates that a patient has been contacted about this reminder, click Record note to view the contact notes associated with that reminder, such as a phone attempt with no reply, or an appointment has already been booked.
  5. If the patient preferred contact is SMS or App, click Send message to open the Send message screen. You can only select templates of type 'Result' if you open this screen from the Follow up Inbox.

    6. Follow up inbox send message

  6. Review the message text and click Send. The message will be sent and a contact note automatically created to record the message send.
  7. Action the reminder according to your practice's guidelines, such as marking as contacted.

Send a message from the patient record

  1. Select Bp Comms > Send patient message from the menu. The Send message window will appear.

    2. Send message from patient record

  2. Review the patient consent (green checkboxes) and ensure that the patient has consented to receive the type of message you are about to send.
  3. Select whether to send via SMS or App. App will only be available if the patient has enrolled for the Best Health App with your practice location. SMS is available if the patient has enrolled for SMS messages. The default Send via selection is based on your practice's Preferred Practice contact method configuration setting.
  4. Select the Template you want to use.
  5. Modify the text if the template permits and click Send. The message will be forwarded to the messaging service.

Send an Electronic Prescription

  1. Select Rx from the patient record and create a prescription as per usual. You can also send an existing repeat Rx by electronic script. See Add or cease Rx for more information.
  2. Tick the check box next to the drug that you want to send an electronic prescription token for. You can select multiple scripts; all selected scripts will be sent by the same method.
  3. Select the method for sending the electronic prescription token from the Token: drop-down menu.

    4. The options are:

    • Paper — Prints the token to a blank sheet of paper. The paper cannot be a preprinted template.
    • SMS (default) — Sends the token to the phone number recorded in the patient demographics.
    • SMS (Other) — Sends the token to a phone number entered by the prescriber, for example, to a carer. Bp Premier will remember the number entered here for the duration of the current visit only.
    • Email (default) — Sends the token to the email address recorded in the patient demographics.
    • Email (Other) — Sends the token to an alternate email address entered by the prescriber.
    • App — Send the token to the Best Health App if the patient is enrolled.

    NOTE  If printing the token to paper, you may wish to explain that the printed token is an evidence of prescription only, and not the actual script they may be used to receiving.

  4. Click eScript to send.

    5. As of Saffron SP1, if electronic prescribing has not been correctly configured, an alert will appear indicating which information is required in order for electronic prescribing to work.

  5. If you have prescribed a schedule 8 drug, you will be prompted to re-enter your Bp Premier password. Re-enter your password and click OK. See Sending schedule 8 electronic prescriptions for more information.
  6. If you selected 'SMS (Other)' or 'Email (Other)', Bp Premier will prompt to enter the phone number or email address to send to. Enter a number with no spaces or an email address, and click Continue.

    7. Send escript token to other phone number

  7. As of Saffron SP1, the Verify eScript screen will appear. Check that the information provided for the script or scripts being sent is correct, then click Send.

  8. If the electronic prescription is successfully received by the prescription exchange service, Bp Premier will show a success alert.

If the electronic prescription was not successfully sent, or the attempt times out, Bp Premier will report an error.

Failed to send the escript

IMPORTANT  If an error occurs when sending the electronic prescription, Bp Premier will automatically print the script to preprinted paper by default and mark the script as printed.

If sending by SMS or email, the number or email address will receive a message with a hyperlink in it only a few seconds after being sent from Bp Premier. The receiver must click the hyperlink on their device to view the token, which will contain a QR code that can be scanned at or forwarded to the pharmacy.

If sending by via the Best Health App, the patient will receive the message in the app inbox.

NOTE   If the patient has third-party apps on their device that can be used to display electronic prescription tokens (for example, a pharmacy app), the token may open in the third-party app instead. This depends on the operating system configuration of those apps. When the patient receives the token via the Best Health App for the first time, they can choose how they would like to open their token. They will still be able to obtain their script.

What are contact notes?

A contact note represents any attempt by the practice to contact a patient, by phone, letter, or any electronic method consented to by the patient. A note records: the details of the patient or person contacted (if a next of kin or carer responds, for example); the contact reason; communication method; the number of contact attempts for related communications; and the success status.

Contact notes demonstrate a detailed history of patient contact throughout clinical workflows such as pathology and clinical reminders. Most contact notes are generated automatically from Bp Premier functions like a clinical or appointment reminder mail merge, but you can also record a contact note manually from places like the Followup Inbox.

Record a contact note

  1. To add a general note, search for the patient (F2) and click View > Contact notes.

    2. To add a clinical-related note, open the appropriate window in Bp Premier and click Record note.

  2. Click Add. The Contact note screen will appear.

    3. Contact Note

  3. If you contacted (or tried to contact) someone other than the patient, select Contact type in the Other contact’s details section to indicate the relationship with the patient. The other fields will be populated with information stored in the database, if any.
  4. Under Communication details, select the Contact reason and Contact method. For most functions, the Contact Reason will be preselected and cannot be changed.
  5. If the contact method is 'Phone', select the person you spoke to from the Contact with field. If the contact person does not fit any of the listed contacts (such as a flatmate), select 'Not specified' and follow your practice guidelines for recording the contact (such as recording a name and relationship in User comments).
  6. Add any User comments and select the Message status for the contact attempt at the bottom right. The options available depend on the Contact method selected, and may be automatically set.
  7. Click Save to save the contact note and return to the Contact notes screen.

Audit the contact history

  1. Press F10 to open the Patient list. Search for the patient by name, or click Advanced search to search by DOB, Medicare number, or HI number.
  2. Select the patient from the list of search results and click Contact notes in the bottom right corner, or press Alt+C. The Contact notes screen will appear.

    3. Contact notes list

  3. Use the Reason, Method, and Message status filters along the top to restrict the contact records shown. For example, select ‘Unsuccessful’ from the Status filter to view only unsuccessful contact attempts that need following up.
  4. Select a date range and a Location to restrict the records shown.
  5. Filter from where within Bp Premier the message was sent from by using the Origin list. The Origin list could contain the options All, Inbox, Follow up Inbox and Patient record. Options available in the Origin list depends upon from where within Bp Premier contact notes for this patient has been sent. Select All if you are searching for a Contact Note that was not sent from either the Inbox, Follow up Inbox or Patient Record.
  6. Tick Show deleted at the bottom to include deleted contact note records in the list.
  7. Click View to open a contact record, Print to print the selected contact note, or Patient details to open the patient demographics screen for the patient.

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