deleting patient

[hec]

Can you make a way to delete a patient that has never been seen in the office. We get new patients that call to schedule appointment and then no show and we can’t delete their profile. Right now we just change erase their data and change name to “A,A” and next time we have a new patient we use that profile but their should be easier way to do this. I know there’s a legal issue with not allowing deleting of patients but there should be a way to go around this for patient who doesn’t have any records or invoices created.

[bbalthasar]

I do not think you can delete. You can set them as inactive, That is what we do.

[Kraig]

bbalthasar is correct. Patients can be set as inactive, but are unable to be deleted.

[hec]

I know we can make them inactive but it seems silly to have inactive patients that we have never even seen once or done a transaction with them.

[KizerOpt]

Jan 23, 2018 13:30:35 GMT -6 hec said:

I know we can make them inactive but it seems silly to have inactive patients that we have never even seen once or done a transaction with them.

Someone once suggested writing over the info in them to use them for new patients. You might try that....

Karen

[mdeyedoc]

It's been requested many times over the years. We used to change the name and overwrite the file info but that became a pain if they had insurance info too. I can understand not allowing a delete of a patient with med recs or billing history but it makes no sense why we can't totally delete a patient with neither of those.

Marcia

[friscoeyeassociates]

I agree that with no invoices or med recs we should be able to delete. That being said how much of an issue is this really for practices using Crystal?? I seem to NEVER have an issue with these charts being out there in the inactive "ether".. They just simply never show up or have any affect on the entry, search-ability, or storage of data in any meaningful way that I can find. Also, despite not knowing why they will not let us delete a chart with no recs or billing, I actually quite like the fact that there is no way to delete a patient if for no other reason than because I know for a fact its not possible. For instance hypothetically if it were possible to delete a patient then at some point down the road if I were for whatever reason unable to find a patient in the database then I would have to wonder if human error or even willful negligence by a disgruntled employee were to be responsible. Suffice it to say, there is at least some comfort in knowing that its not even possible to delete someone even if it does seem overly presumptuous by the developers to assume there would never be a scenario where permanent and complete deletion would be the preferred method of action.

[mdeyedoc]

I just don't like the idea of having patients in my database that were never really patients. If you are only allowed to delete people with no transaction or med record history, you wouldn't have anything to fear.

OTOH, some people like to keep them in the system so that they can see that they scheduled a previous appt and never showed up.

Marcia

[KizerOpt]

The part that bothers me about them, is, until you realize they are hanging out there but not inactive, they skew your numbers for any MU reporting or other reports. We've had new patients miss or cancel their appt and are not deactivated. Years later, I find them in the system with no invoice, no medical records, and no recall, but they are counted as an active patient. The only time I would really like to delete one is when you merge two that are identical. Obviously, you don't need both.

karen

[Kraig]

Feb 27, 2018 15:49:20 GMT -6 KizerOpt said:

The part that bothers me about them, is, until you realize they are hanging out there but not inactive, they skew your numbers for any MU reporting or other reports. We've had new patients miss or cancel their appt and are not deactivated. Years later, I find them in the system with no invoice, no medical records, and no recall, but they are counted as an active patient. The only time I would really like to delete one is when you merge two that are identical. Obviously, you don't need both.

karen

We take 15 or more calls a month where people merged the wrong patient. 

[Bridgeport Eye Center]

After merging two patients it would be nice if they actually merged into ONE chart! Why is the duplicate file kept as an inactive chart? Very frustrating that there is still two charts! There should be a way to get rid of the duplicate file, I have seen in a different EHR if two charts where merged in the patient "audit log" it would show a time stamp of when and by who that the chart was merged...how do other office currently deal with the "extra inactive duplicate chart"? Our DR's hate searching a patient and more then one comes up even if it is inactive...

[KizerOpt]

Dec 17, 2020 13:04:38 GMT -6 Bridgeport Eye Center said:

After merging two patients it would be nice if they actually merged into ONE chart! Why is the duplicate file kept as an inactive chart? Very frustrating that there is still two charts! There should be a way to get rid of the duplicate file, I have seen in a different EHR if two charts where merged in the patient "audit log" it would show a time stamp of when and by who that the chart was merged...how do other office currently deal with the "extra inactive duplicate chart"? Our DR's hate searching a patient and more then one comes up even if it is inactive...

I think it probably has more to do with the very real possibility of merging the wrong charts. At least you can get back to the other one. I've been surprised how many patients have the same name in our small community. The Drs might set their search for active only to avoid seeing the inactive files. It is annoying to have records you KNOW should be deleted, but better safe than sorry, I guess.

Karen