Block/Slot Automation

Templates protect the shape of the day

Most eClinicalWorks practices build provider templates: morning blocks for procedures, a few same-day slots held for sick visits, new patient time at set points in the week. The template is how a practice keeps each physician's day shaped the way it should be.

Templates only work if whoever books respects them. A rushed booking that drops a medication check into a procedure block costs the practice twice: the wasted procedure time and the patient who could not get in.

How Katie decides what to offer

Katie offers a caller only times that are open on the eClinicalWorks schedule and that your rules allow for that visit type. A follow-up request is matched to follow-up time; a new patient to new patient time.

Time you want held back, such as same-day sick slots, is kept out of routine offers by rule, so it is still free when the call that needs it arrives.

The caller hears a short list of real options rather than the whole calendar. That keeps the conversation quick and keeps the parts of the template you protect away from patients who would happily take them for a routine visit.

When the right slot is not open

Sometimes the only open time sits in a slot type the request does not fit. Katie does not squeeze the visit in. She offers the next suitable time, or records the request, the patient's availability and the reason so a scheduler can decide whether to override the template.

That keeps template overrides a human decision, made by someone who knows why the block is there and whether this patient justifies breaking it.

Signals your templates need work

Once every call is answered and summarized, mismatches between your templates and your demand become visible. Watch for these patterns in the first month.

• Callers repeatedly asking for a visit type with no open slots
• Same-day slots still empty by early afternoon
• Schedulers overriding the same block every week
• New patient waits growing while follow-up time sits unused

Visit length is part of the template

A slot is a start time and a duration. If your template gives a new patient visit a long block but the rule Katie follows says something shorter, the schedule fills in ways nobody intended. Before launch, line up each visit type's length in your rules with how your eClinicalWorks templates are actually built, and revisit it whenever a physician changes their template.