Patient Registration

 

For more information about the fields on the Patient Registration page, see the Field Reference.

1. Display the Patient Registration page: On the Main Menu, click Patients. Under PATIENT REGISTRATION, click New Patient Registration.

Identification

2. Legal last name — Enter the patient's legal last name.
3. Legal first name — Enter the patient's legal first name.
4. First name used — Enter the patient's preferred first name or nickname, if any. This name appears in the patient banner (along with the legal first name); on the patient schedule; in athenaCommunicator messages (email, SMS, and phone); and on the Patient Portal.
   Note: The name in the First name used field can reflect the patient's gender identity. For more information about the patient banner for transgender and nonbinary people, see Transgender and Nonbinary Patient Care.
5. Middle name, suffix — Enter the patient's middle name and name suffix (for example, Jr.), if any.
6. Previous name (last, first) — Enter the patient's previous first and last names (if applicable): last name in the left-most field and first name in the right-most field.
7. Legal sex — Enter the patient's legal sex (male or female) on legal documents such as the insurance card or driver's license.
8. DOB — Enter the patient's date of birth.
9. SSN — Enter the patient's Social Security number.
   Note: You can enter SSNs when you first register a patient or when you add an SSN to an existing patient registration. To see the full 9 digits of already-entered SSNs, you must have the "Display Full SSN" role.
10. Mother's maiden name — Enter the maiden name of the patient's mother.
    Note: This information is used only as an additional means of determining identity, especially if information is received from non-athenahealth systems.
11. Preferred name (discontinued) — The Preferred name field has been replaced by the First name used field. For more information about moving existing information in this field, see the Field Reference.

Contact

12. Address — Enter the patient's address. For apartments, use this format: 1199 Whitney Ave #310.
    Note: You can click the Check address option (to the right of the ZIP code field) to validate the address that you entered (you must first enter the address and either the ZIP code or the city and state).
    
13. Address (ctd) — Enter additional address information, if needed.
14. ZIP code — Enter the patient's 5-digit ZIP code (the City and State fields are automatically filled in).
15. City — Enter the patient's city.
16. State — Enter the patient's state.
17. Country — If the Country field appears, select the patient's country.
    athenaOne automatically formats foreign mailing addresses according to the country's specifications for all claims, bills, statements, and other correspondence. 
    Note: If you select a country other than the United States, select the country from the menu, and then enter the two-letter postal abbreviation for the country in the State field.
18. ID Number Override — If your practice generates its own numeric patient IDs (rather than using athenaOne auto-generated patient IDs), enter the number. If you leave this blank, athenaOne automatically assigns the patient an ID number. This field appears only at the time of initial patient registration.
19. Home phone — Enter the patient's home phone number.
20. Mobile phone — Enter the patient's mobile phone number.
• If the mobile phone is the same as the patient's home phone, click the Copy from home link.
• If the patient does not have a mobile phone or declines to provide the number, select the None option.
21. Consent to call — The Consent to call field helps you comply with the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. This field indicates whether you obtained "express consent" from the patient to receive automated calls from your practice to the patient's mobile phone. Automated calls include ReminderCall, GroupCall, ResultsCall, and Self-Pay calls.
22. Consent to text — This field indicates whether you obtained "express consent" from the patient to send automated text messages from your practice to the patient's mobile phone. Automated text messages are used by the ReminderCall, GroupCall, ResultsCall, and Self-Pay services. If the patient consents to receive text messages, athenaOne automatically enables the Text Message options in the Communicator Automated Messaging Preferences section of the Privacy Information page for that patient. Patients are charged standard message and data rates for text messages from your practice. Note: If a phone number is provided in the Mobile phone field, you must set the Consent to text option to Yes or No to save changes on the Check-in, Patient Registration, or Quickview page.
23. Work phone — Enter the patient's work phone number.
24. Patient email — Enter the patient's valid email address. This field is required on the Patient Registration and Check-in pages for practices using athenaCollector and athenaCommunicator.
    Selecting the No email option clears any email address or other notation present in the Patient email field.
    If the No email option is already selected, the patient has already informed another staff member at your practice that he or she does not have an email address or does not wish to provide one.
25. Portal access — This field displays the Patient Portal status of the patient and the patient's family members. You can invite a patient or family member to register for the Patient Portal (or the Patient Information Center), and you can view Patient Portal access for the patient and the patient's family members. For more information, see "Portal access section."
26. Contact preference — Select the contact method preferred by the patient.
    Note: The contact preference that you select on this page has no effect on the athenaCommunicator messaging preferences configured on the Privacy Information page.

Demographics

27. Language — Select the patient's preferred language from the menu. By default, a short list of the values that you most commonly select appears. To select a different value, enter the first few letters of the desired language and select it from the list.
    Note: If the patient does not provide a language, select the Patient Declined option.
28. Race — Select the patient's racial affiliation from the menu. By default, a short list of the values that you most commonly select appears. To select a different value, enter the first few letters of the desired language and select it from the list. To select more than one race, click the plus icon .
    Note: If the patient does not provide a race, select the Patient Declined option.
29. Ethnicity — Select the patient's ethnic affiliation. By default, a short list of the values that you most commonly select appears. To select a different value, enter the first few letters of the desired option and select it from the list. To select more than one ethnicity, click the plus icon .
    Note: If the patient does not provide an ethnicity, select the Patient Declined option.
30. Marital status — Select the patient's marital status from the menu.
31. Sexual orientation — Select the patient's sexual or romantic preference from the menu.
    Note: The options in the Sexual orientation field are based on 2015 edition certification requirements. If you see patients with additional sexual orientations, select the Something else, please describe option and enter the patient information in the free-text field.
32. Gender identity — Select the patient's internal sense of self as male, female, both male and female, or neither gender. A patient may identify as transgender or nonbinary if their gender identity is different than their assigned sex at birth.
    Note: The options in the Gender identity field are based on 2015 edition certification requirements. If you see patients with additional gender identities, select the Additional gender category / other, please specify option and enter the patient information in the free-text field.
33. Assigned sex at birth — Select the patient's assigned sex at birth. The patient's sex assigned at birth is generally determined by their physical anatomy at birth. This may be the same or different than the patient's gender identity and legal sex.
34. Pronouns — Select the personal pronouns that reflect the patient's gender identity (the pronouns may not be tied to the patient's gender identity).
35. Homebound? — Select Yes or No to indicate whether the patient is homebound.

Additional Information

36. How did you hear about us? — Select the route by which the patient heard about your practice.
    The contents of this menu are administered on the Referral Sources page.
37. Specify (if Other, above) — If you select Other in the How did you hear about us? field, you can enter a free-text source here.
38. Patient care summary and patient letter delivery preference — Select Portal or Paper to indicate whether the patient prefers to receive provider-signed letters and the Patient Care Summary on the Patient Portal or on paper.
    Note: In an ambulatory department that uses athenaClinicals but not athenaCommunicator, your patients can access their electronic Patient Care Summary online using the Patient Information Center, a slimmed-down version of the athenaCommunicator Patient Portal.

Provider/Registration Dates

39. Usual provider — Select the patient's primary provider.
    Note: By default, the name of the rendering provider is printed at the top of patient statements. If you prefer to print the name of the usual provider at the top of patient statements, please contact the CSC by selecting Support > Create Case or Call in the Main Menu.
40. Registration department — Select the department in which the patient was initially registered.
41. Primary department — Select the patient's current active department, typically the department in which the patient chart is kept. The primary department may differ from the department of registration if the patient was transferred from one department to another.
42. Chart home — Select the department where the patient's chart is normally kept.
43. Registration date — Enter the date that the patient was registered in the athenaOne system. For new patients, the default value is the current date.
44. Deceased date — If the patient is deceased, enter the date of death. When a date is entered in this field, the field is displayed on the patient Quickview page with the date in red.

Privacy

45. Notices on file — Select the relevant options to indicate that the patient received the notices.
    Note: If you select the Privacy Notice option in the Notices on file field, athenaOne automatically sets the Medication History Authority field to Yes (if you have not yet selected Yes or No for this field).
    
46. CIIS Consent — Appears if your practice uses an immunization registry interface with athenaClinicals.
    Note: This field appears only after the initial patient registration information has been saved.
47. Medication History Authority — Select Yes to indicate that the patient has signed a consent form allowing your practice to download his or her medication history. You should first consult your practice's HIPAA compliance committee to verify that your current privacy consent forms cover medication history downloads.
    Note: If you select the Privacy Notice option in the Notices on file field, athenaOne automatically sets the Medication History Authority field to Yes (if you have not yet selected Yes or No for this field).
48. Patient notes — Enter any internal notes about the patient in this field. The notes you enter here also appear in the Patient notes field on the patient Quickview page and on the Check-in page. The notes are not printed on any form. If the patient has a guarantor other than self, athenahealth recommends that you enter the name and phone number of the guarantor in this field for your billing staff's convenience.

Emergency Contact

49. Name — Enter the name of the emergency contact for the patient. This is for reference only and is not used anywhere else.
50. Relationship — Enter the relationship of the contact to the patient.
51. Home phone — Enter the emergency contact's phone number.
52. Mobile phone — Enter the emergency contact's mobile phone number.

Next of Kin

53. Name — Enter the full name of the patient's next of kin.
54. Relationship — Select the next of kin's relationship to the patient.
55. Phone — Enter the next of kin's phone number.

Employment

56. Employer name — Click choose to access the tool and select the name of the patient's employer. If the patient's relationship to insured is SELF when adding an insurance policy, the Employer name field on the patient's Add Update Policy Details page defaults to the value in this field.
57. Employer phone — Enter the phone number of the patient's employer. This field is for reference only.
58. Usual occupation — Enter the first few characters of the patient's current or most recent occupation and select it from the matching list. If the occupation is not found, enter it as free text.
59. Usual industry — Enter the first few characters of the patient's occupational industry and select it from the matching list. If the industry is not found, enter it as free text.

Guardian

60. Last name — If the patient is under the care of a guardian who is not the same person as the guarantor (for example, in the case of separated parents), enter the last name of the patient's legal guardian. This is for reference only and is not used anywhere else in the system.
61. First name — First name of the patient's legal guardian.
62. Middle name, suffix — Middle name and name suffix of the patient's legal guardian.

Guarantor Information

The guarantor is the person who appears as the addressee on patient statements. If Patient's relationship to guarantor is set to Self, the patient's address is used as the address for patient statements.

A best practice for family billing is to designate one (and only one) family member as the guarantor for the entire family. Once selected, this guarantor receives patient statements for "patient's responsibility" balances incurred by any family member.

63. Patient's relationship to guarantor — Select who the patient is in relation to the guarantor. The guarantor is the person who appears as the addressee on patient statements.
    
    If a new patient is a minor, you must select a guarantor relationship. However, if the Specialty type field on the Departments page is set to "Pediatric Medicine," this field defaults to "Child." This field also defaults to "Child" at the provider group level if the Group specialty field on the Provider Groups page is set to "Pediatric Medicine."

Guarantor (name to whom statements are sent)

64. Last name — Enter the last name of the patient's guarantor, if the guarantor is not the patient and not a patient at your practice.
65. First name — Enter the first name of the patient's guarantor.
66. Middle name, suffix — Enter the middle initial and suffix (for example, Sr., Jr., etc.) of the patient's guarantor.
67. DOB — Enter the date of birth of the patient's guarantor (optional).

Mailing address

68. Same as patient's address — Select this option if the guarantor's address is the same as the patient's.

69. Address — Enter the guarantor's address (if different from patient's).
    Note: You can click the Check address option (to the right of the ZIP code field) to validate the address that you entered (you must first enter the address and either the ZIP code or the city and state).
    
70. Address (ctd) — Enter the second line of the guarantor's address.
71. ZIP code — Enter the guarantor's ZIP code (if different from the patient's). After you enter the guarantor's ZIP code, the City and State fields are automatically filled in.
72. City — Enter the guarantor's city.
73. State — Enter the guarantor's state.
74. Country — Select the country in which the guarantor resides.

Optional information

75. SSN — Enter the guarantor's Social Security number (optional).
    Note: Practice staff registering patients for the first time or editing registration information can enter and re-enter SSNs, but cannot see the full nine digits of SSNs that have already been entered without the "Display Full SSN" user role.
76. Phone — Enter the guarantor's phone (optional).
77. Email — Enter the guarantor's email address. Select the No Guarantor Email option if the guarantor has no email address or declines to provide it.
78. Employer — Enter the guarantor's employer (optional).

Billing

79. Statements delivered online only — Select this option if the patient wants to have statements delivered online only via the Patient Portal. This option appears if your practice has the Allow Online Statements feature enabled and the patient uses the athenaCommunicator Patient Portal.
80. Statement note — Enter a note that will be printed on statements for this patient (75 characters max). The note appears on the patient statement above the dunning message.
81. Statement note effective date — By default, the effective date for the statement note you enter is from today's date until one year later, but you can edit these dates.
82. You can save the information as follows:
    • Click Save to save the information and go to the patient Quickview page without adding an insurance policy.
    • Click Save and Add Insurance to proceed to the Add Policy page. To check in a patient for an appointment, you must select a primary insurance policy for the patient or select the self-pay option.
    • Click Save and Schedule to proceed to the Schedule Appointment page.

    Note: If yours is an athenaEnterprise organization and the Practice Setting for CPI Synchronization is enabled, the selected set of fields, when updated, will propagate through the athenaEnterprise. See also: Common Patient Index.

 

If you accessed this page using the Register Family Member option in the Patient Actions Bar, you can also register a family member using the pre-filled fields from the related patient.

Note: This option requires the Family Billing feature.

1. Display the patient Quickview page for the head of the family.
2. On the Patient Actions Bar, click Registration, and select Register Family Member.
3. Verify or edit the pre-filled information.
4. Complete the registration fields.

Add insurance information (recommended)

5. To copy the insurance policy information from the other family member, select the Copy insurance policy information from patient name option (at the bottom of the page).
6. To add a different insurance policy, click Save and Add Insurance to display the Add Policy page. (To check in a patient for an appointment, you must select a primary insurance policy for the patient or select the self-pay option.)

Save or save and schedule an appointment

7. Click Save to save the information and go to the patient Quickview page without adding an insurance policy.
8. Click Save and Schedule to proceed to the Schedule Appointment page.

 

Note: This option requires the Family Billing feature.

1. Display the patient Quickview page for the head of the family.
2. On the Patient Actions Bar, click Registration, and then click Full Registration.
3. Click the add patient to this family link to access the Family Member Lookup tool.
4. Select the family member that you want to add.
5. Click Save.
   The Patient Registration page appears with the family information pre-filled.
6. Verify or edit the pre-filled information.
7. Complete the registration fields.

Save or save and schedule an appointment

8. Click Save to save the information and display the patient Quickview page without adding an insurance policy.
9. Click Save and Schedule to display the Schedule Appointment page.

1. Display the Patient Registration page: On the Main Menu, click Patients. Under PATIENT REGISTRATION, click New Patient Registration.
2. Scroll down and locate the Family Members (share the same guarantor) heading on the lower right side of the page.
3. Click show family structure. The Show Family Structure window opens, showing a tree-like diagram of the family structure.

 

Important: If you update certain fields on the Patient Registration page, make sure to reconcile the new information with the information on the Update Policy Details page (see "Registration field edits that affect insurance policies").

1. Display the Patient Registration page: On the Patient Actions Bar, click Registration, and then click Full Registration.
2. Update fields as needed.
3. You now have two options:
• Click Save to display the patient Quickview page.
• Click Save and Schedule to display the Schedule Appointment page.
  

 

 

Note: When you update gender identity fields on the Quickview, Patient Registration, or Check-in page, athenaOne automatically synchronizes the information with the patient banner and the Social History chart section.

1. On the Quickview, Patient Registration, or Check-in page, scroll down to the Demographics section.
2. Sexual orientation — Select the patient's sexual orientation from the menu.
• Lesbian, gay or homosexual
• Straight or heterosexual
• Bisexual
• Something else, please describe
• Don't know
• Choose not to disclose
3. If you select the Something else, please describe option, a free-text field appears. Enter the patient information in this field.
4. Gender identity — Select the patient's gender identity from the menu.
• Identifies as Male
• Identifies as Female
• Transgender Male/Female-to-Male (FTM)
• Transgender Female/Male-to-Female (MTF)
• Gender non-conforming (neither exclusively male nor female)
• Additional gender category / other, please specify
• Choose not to disclose
5. If you select the Additional gender category / other, please specify option, a free-text field appears. Enter the patient information in this field.
6. Assigned sex at birth — Select the patient's assigned sex at birth. The patient's sex assigned at birth is generally determined by their physical anatomy at birth. This may be the same or different than the patient's gender identity and legal sex.
• Male
• Female
• Choose not to disclose
• Unknown
7. Pronouns — Select the personal pronouns that reflect the patient's gender identity.
• he/him
• she/her
• they/them
8. Click Save.
   The information appears in the patient banner.

Note: To protect patient privacy, the data in the Sexual orientation, Gender identity, and Assigned sex at birth fields is masked on the Quickview, Patient Registration, and Check-In pages. To edit these fields, click Edit.

 

 

You can create custom messages that print on statements for an individual patient. For example, you can create a patient note to notify the patient about a new, customized payment plan, or to remind a patient of a billing-related agreement policy.

Note: The simplified patient statements used with the Online Statement-based Experience (formerly QuickPay Portal) do not display custom statement notes. For information about simplified and standard patient statements, see Patient Statement Samples.

 

To enter a patient statement note, display the Patient Registration page: On the Patient Actions Bar, click Registration, and then click Full Registration. Enter the text of the note in the Statement note field. This field is limited to 75 characters.

 

Tip: You can create custom messages that are printed on statements for your entire practice using the Practice Statement Note page. These messages are printed for all patients on a statement run for your practice. You can use this function as a communication tool. For example, you can create a practice statement note to notify patients that a new doctor has joined the practice or when the flu clinic is scheduled for the upcoming year.

 

1. Display the Patient Registration page for the head of the family: On the Patient Actions Bar, click Registration, and then click Full Registration.
2. Scroll to the bottom of the page.
3. Click the show history link. The registration audit history is displayed at the bottom of the page.

Note: If you requested that athenahealth import patients from another system on your behalf, the audit history shows that the patient was created by a username structured as follows: [username].[importID].

 

 

You can register patients and their family members for the Patient Portal or the Patient Information Center while the patient is in the office from the Quickview, Check-in, Checkout, and Patient Registration pages.

Note: The starting point for the registration workflow is slightly different on the Checkout and Patient Registration pages. The instructions on this page begin on the Quickview or Check-in page.

 

Important: To comply with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), patients under the age of 13 cannot create self-registered Patient Portal accounts, and you cannot register or invite new Patient Portal users under the age of 13.

 

Practice users (including clinical providers) can register a patient or family member as follows:

• From a practice computer.
• From a kiosk (a desktop, laptop, or tablet computer set up for this task).
• Using the patient's smartphone (iPhone or Android device).
  Note: The smartphone option is not available when registering a patient for the Patient Information Center.
• By sending an invitation email to the patient's registered email address in athenaOne.

Practice users can register patients for the Patient Portal at any stage of the patient encounter. A dedicated practice user can also help patients register for the Patient Portal before check-in.

Important: Register your patients (or their family members) in the office to increase the likelihood that you will meet quality program measures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note: You must have permissions to view clinical documents and register new patients to perform these steps.

1. Open a CCDA file in HOLD status.
2. Click register new patient at the top of the page.
   Some demographic fields are populated automatically.
3. Complete the patient registration.
4. Click Save to return to the document.

 

athenaOne uses the following duplicate checking to determine whether a patient is already registered in your practice or in your common patient index (CPI):

• First name + Last name — This check ignores non-alphanumeric characters (hyphens, apostrophes, etc.) when checking for duplicates. For example, "Mc-Briant" matches "McBriant."
• Home phone
• SSN — A Social Security number entered as any series of nine digits that are exactly the same (e.g., 999999999, 111111111, or 222-22-2222, etc.) will not trigger the duplicate patient prompt even though another patient may have this same false SSN. athenahealth recommends that you enter the patient's correct SSN, if available.
• Last name + First name + DOB

 

With the Family Billing feature, you can collect payments for any family member at any point during the workflow, using the Collect Payment page. The family guarantor receives a single patient statement for the entire family, itemized by patient, with details for each transaction.

 

From the Patient Registration page, you can add new and existing patients as family members and remove family members from a family using the remove link next to the patient's name (located under the Guarantor fields on the right side of the page). Or you can remove the current patient from the family by clicking remove this patient from family.

 

Note: When you remove a patient from a family billing relationship, athenaOne does not delete the guarantor data in the patient's account. You can update or delete this data manually on the Patient Registration page. If the patient is billed under a guarantor in multiple departments, you must remove the patient from the guarantor in each department before you can update the Patient's relationship to guarantor field to Self.

 

 

 

 

 

Your practice may have custom demographic fields that are not in the Field Reference. Your practice must have the Demographic Custom Fields practice setting enabled in order to use this feature. For more information, refer to Demographic Custom Fields.

 

 

After you learn that a patient is deceased, you should cancel all future appointments in one action.

 

Appointment cancellation reasons are specific to your practice. You can add cancellation reasons using the Appointment Cancellation Reasons page.

 

Note: Marking a patient as deceased or inactive does not prevent statements from going out. To prevent a statement from going out to a patient, the statement must be held.

 

 

 

The Portal access section on the Checkout and Patient Registration pages displays the Patient Portal status of the patient and the patient's family members. From this section, you can:

• Invite a patient or family member to register for the Patient Portal (or the Patient Information Center).
• View and manage Patient Portal access for this patient, including access by family members.

The Portal access section displays the names of all Patient Portal users who have access to this patient record. You can also:

• Click a Patient Portal user name to view the date that the user last logged in and the relationship of the user to the patient.
  • If the Patient Portal user has successfully completed registration, you can send a password reset email if necessary.
  • If the user has not registered, you can register the user in the office by clicking the Register now link. The invitation menu opens for you to register the user via one of several methods.
    Note: For instructions on how to register a user for the Patient Portal, see To register a patient for the Patient Portal or Patient Information Center in the office.
• Confirm that the patient record is the same as the Patient Portal user name to verify that the patient has access to his own Patient Portal.
  Note: Any other names that appear are Patient Portal users who have full access or billing-only access to the patient record.

 

 

 

 

 

If your practice is a federally qualified health center (FQHC), you can use the following fields on the Quickview, Patient Registration, or Check-in page to collect data and calculate the federal poverty level of patients. This information also improves data collection for UDS reporting.

Note: The School-based health center patient and Public housing patient fields are not used in UDS reporting. However, you can designate a department as a school-based site or as a public housing service delivery site for UDS reporting. See To configure a department for UDS reporting.

• Family size
• Income
• Income level
• Agricultural worker
• Homeless status
• School-based health center patient
• Veteran status
• Public housing patient

Note: The data in the Family size, Income, and Income level fields is masked to protect patient privacy and avoid disclosure of sensitive demographic information. To edit these fields, click Edit or View.

 

 

 

 

For information about creating a poverty-based sliding fee plan for a patient, see the Poverty-Based Sliding Fee Plans or the Quickview page.