Introduction to CTAppointments

Open the Launcher and click the CTAppointments icon, which will open our CTAppointments sign-up page in your browser. Follow the instructions presented there for how to sign up:

Once you have signed up, click the Launcher's CTAppointments icon again to launch the application:

1. Click the Visit Purpose tab and set up your list of visit purpose types for your Online Appointments site.
2. Click the Provider Availability tab and set up the list and conditions for the participating providers.
3. Click the Site and Settings tab and set up the appearance and scheduling preferences for the site.

Once this is done you can review the results and add a link to the Online Appointments site to your clinic's web site, and start enabling your patients to book their own appointments. The link is found on the Site and Settings screen:

Once you have configured your Online Appointments site through the settings in CTAppointments, the basic process works as follows: You invite patients to participate, either through CTAppointments, the Front Desk, or Scheduler. The invitation will be sent in an email. This email includes a link to your Online Appointments web site.

Alternatively, a patient (or anyone) might find a registration link on your practice's web site and access Online Appointments that way.

By either route, they access your Online Appointments site and register:

• If the registrant accessed the site via your email invitation – Because the emails are only sent to your own active patients, CTAppointments knows that they already have a clinic account and creates an account in Online Appointments automatically. So, when taken to the Online Appointments site the patient only needs to create a password at this stage. Once the patient completes their registration in this way CTAppointments will link the two accounts automatically and give the patient the ability to book their appointments online right away.
• If the registrant accessed the site via the Online Appointments link on your web site – CTAppointments cannot determine if the web visitor is already a patient. So, the registrant will be required to submit additional, basic information when registering, e.g., first and last name, email address, phone number, in addition to creating a password. These registrants will be placed in a special list in CTAppointments that you must review and evaluate on a case by case basis. If you determine that a registrant is a patient of yours, you can link the two accounts manually, and the patient will then be able to log in and book their own appointments.

About Patient Sign-in Credentials and Possible Email Address Changes

For the patient's Online Appointments account, their email address is their user ID, their "username". Once the patient has been invited, if a subsequent change to the patient's actual email address in ChiroTouch has been made due to some necessity, you can remove the invitation and then resend it. The patient will then be sent a invitation at their new email address.

IMPORTANT:  Once the patient accepts the invitation and their accounts are linked, any subsequent change to their email address in ChiroTouch will not affect their Online Appointments user ID. All CTAppointments email messages will continue be sent to the original email address.

Therefore, in order to update a patient's email and user ID you must remove their account link and disable their existing online account, and then sent the patient a new invitation to register.

This will not affect any appointments the patient might have already booked using the old Online Appointments account.

CTAppointments provides for email notifications to be sent to the practice and to patients when certain key events occur.

Your practice will receive an email when: 

• An invited patient registers at your Online Appointments site
• A person registers at your Online Appointments site via your web site*
• A patient books an appointment online*

* These are options, configurable through CTAppointments.

The patient will receive an email when:

• They are invited by you to register for online appointment scheduling
• They registered via your web site and you manually link their accounts to activate online appointment scheduling
• They book an appointment request online
• Their appointment request is accepted
• Their appointment request is denied due to schedule unavailability

Some Examples

Invitation to a patient to register with Online Appointments, with link highlighted: 

 

Notification to a registrant (a person who signed up via your web site) that they have been linked to a patient account and are now able to book their own appointments:

 

Notification to the practice that a patient booked an appointment:

 

Notification to the patient confirming that their appointment has been confirmed:

NOTE:  Appointment confirmations may come with a file attachment that the patient can use to add the appointment to their own calendar.

 

Getting Help and Guidance While Using CTAppointments

All of the main screens have a handy link to these Online Manual help pages. Clicking on one of these links takes you to the page discussing how to use that tool or feature.

Working with Tables

Most of the tables within CTAppointments give you the ability to sort by a column alphanumerically, by clicking the heading. This will sort the table by that column, ascending or descending, alternately.

NOTE:  To restore any table's ordering and configuration to its original state, click to another CTAppointments tab, then return to refresh the settings. For example, to restore the original ordering of the Visit Purpose table: 1) click Site and Settings, then 2) click Visit Purpose again.

See here to learn how the Scheduler synchronizes information with your Online Appointments web site.

This service has its own report: "CTAppointments Scheduled Patients". See here for further information.