Attempt II - The Adventure of Recall

[alkhaef]

Hello all,

I recently gave my second shot at trying to set up the Recalls feature of OpenDental and making it compatible with our scheduling protocols, and this time I made quite a bit of progress, and I'm almost there!

In the process, however, I ran into a few gotchas where the behavior wasn't quite what one would expect from following directions and reading documentation, which cost some time, and also triggered (pun intended) me to spend quite a bit of your support desk people's time too.

I'm posting this here because, although not development related, I have a few suggestions for minor additions to the documentation that would have saved me a lot of time if I'd read them before poking around OD... These aren't revolutionary discoveries, but hopefully they'll fill in some gray areas in understanding and will help some people in the future .

1. One should never re-assign "special type" from one recall type to another without first wiping both recalls clean, otherwise you may end up with existing recalls changing special types.
...In my case, I ended up with lots of patients with a prophy and a perio special type which is very bad. Fortunately, one of the developers helped me quickly take the bullet out of my foot (Darek I believe - thanks!)

2. As a matter of fact, don't change recall types at all without wiping them clean first. Other unexpected bad things might happen.

3. When deciding which recall has an appointment scheduled already (for removal from the recall "list", and for "scheduled date" in the family module), Open Dental ONLY looks at the TRIGGERS, not the procedures for the new appointment. Therefore:
a) You can't have a case where you're trying to create an appt from a trigger that's NOT in the list of procs on the appointment (for example, the endo followup example in the documentation is not possible - i.e. Endo triggers ReEval). If you do this, it will always think the patient is due for that "recall", even after you've scheduled it.
b) An appointment with ANY procedure in the triggers list will look like the recall is scheduled. Therefore, if you happen to have your Prophy recall type configured similar to the documentation at http://opendental.com/manual/recalltypes.html like I do, and someone happens to schedule a comprehensive exam (D0150) for a patient, it will supress the prophy recall until 6 months after the D0150 is completed (probably not something you'd want).

4. Recall types without a "Special Type" are ONLY SECONDARY PROCEDURES THAT WILL BE ADDED TO A RECALL APPOINTMENT, and they will NOT trigger an appointment creation by themselves. Therefore, again, the "endo followup" example in the docs is impossible, because if you set up a recall type for that (say 2 weeks later), the followup check procedure will ONLY show up on the following prophy or perio recall appointment whenever that happens to be, and so there won't be an appointment 2 weeks later.

5. At http://opendental.com/manual/recalltypes.html it says "Every patient will be assigned a prophy recall regardless of any previous triggers. This is to keep patients from falling through the cracks". While true, the recall has no date associated with it, so if your "recall list" window is set up with a start date by default, it looks like this statement is not true. HOWEVER, thanks to a very helpful support person I spoke to today, you can "keep patients from falling through the cracks" simply by removing the start date . I'm sure this is a common question, so it's probably worth mentioning.

PS,
Kudos to anyone who recognizes the reference from the title of this post .

[alkhaef]

EDIT: Added more gems I'd discovered through trial and error and talking to support (#4 and #5).

[jordansparks]

#1 and #2: We will add code to block people from making such changes. We will tell them why they are being blocked.
#3a. I think the point is to view a date range in the recall list. In any case, we admit it's not a good feature.
#4. I disagree. Are you sure you followed the instructions carefully for the endo followup listed at the bottom of
http://www.opendental.com/manual/recalltypes.html
In other words, are you sure you added that type to the list of types that you wanted to show. That's what controls whether it's considered a "secondary procedure", as you put it.
#5. I clearly says in the manual on the recall list page, "Another approach is to have no start date. By doing that, more patients will be included."

[alkhaef]

Hello Dr. Sparks,

Thanks for the reply.

>> #1 and #2: We will add code to block people from making such changes. We will tell them why they are being blocked.

Yes, that's a great idea - that would keep us from shooting ourselves in the foot .

>> #3a. I think the point is to view a date range in the recall list. In any case, we admit it's not a good feature.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean. Maybe I didn't explain well enough. An example might help:
1. Create a recall type called Endo PO: trigger=D3330, appt proc=N4101, frequency=2 weeks
2. Create and complete an appointment with a D3330 on it
3. Go to recall list and "schedule patient" on the "Endo PO" recall
4. Pick a date 2 weeks away and schedule it
5. Refresh the recall list
EXPECTED: That patient's "Endo PO" is no longer in the list, because it's been scheduled already.
ACTUAL: "Endo PO" IS STILL in the list, and will stay there almost indefinitely because there isn't an appointment with D3330 (trigger) on it.
REASON: Recall due date only changes based on trigger-procedures, not target-appointment-procedures.
I know because I've been trying to do something almost identical with a "paper chart recall" recall type.

>> #4. I disagree. Are you sure you followed the instructions carefully for the endo followup listed at the bottom of http://www.opendental.com/manual/recalltypes.html
>> In other words, are you sure you added that type to the list of types that you wanted to show. That's what controls whether it's considered a "secondary procedure", as you put it.

A-ha! I think that functionality was added due to one of my nagging requests about a year ago . Yes, I do have it added as the showing types. And yes, you're right - when the "sched patient" on the recall "list" is used, an appointment is created just for that recall. I thought it still wasn't working because I was using the "sched recall" button on the "make/find appointment" screen, which behaves differently. I think 90% of the time, this difference in behavior isn't a problem, and is actually desired, so I'll consider #4 a case closed. The difference in behavior between "sched patient" and "sched recall" may still be worth mentioning though, otherwise it's up to trial-and-error to discover it.

>> #5. I clearly says in the manual on the recall list page, "Another approach is to have no start date. By doing that, more patients will be included."

Yes, it does say that, but it doesn't say anywhere that "having the start date cleared is a requirement to see these patients: those that had their prophy/perio recall set automatically without a trigger-appointment completed". I read those documentation pages over and over, and I never came away from it understanding that detail, but if you think it's already clear enough, I understand.

==========================

Finally, about #3b, I'm guessing I wasn't clear enough again, so I'll post a better example a-la #3a's new example:
1. Set up recall types exactly like http://opendental.com/manual/recalltypes.html
2. Jane Doe schedules a limited exam only for a broken tooth on 1/1/2012. She just had a exam and cleaning at another office.
3. Jane Doe gets a crown on 1/2/2012.
4. Jane Doe loves the office so much that at checkout she sets up a full-exam appointment for 3/1/2012 and leaves
EXPECTED: Jane Doe's prophy recall is due 6/2/2012(ish)
ACTUAL: Jane Doe's prophy recall is due 9/2/2012
REASON: Recall due date only changes based on trigger-procedures, not target-appointment-procedures.

[jordansparks]

3b. Recall and planned appointments complement each other. At any exam, the staff would decide on the planned appointment. That includes any necessary prophy. Also. most exams will be done at the same appointment as prophies anyway. Taking all of the above into account, the example you give demonstrates automation behavior that is good enough. Not perfect, but definitely good enough.