Beds, the emergency department and missed appointments

A bed holds only as many patients as its capacity; the emergency screens show how long each patient has been in; an appointment nobody arrived for shows as missed.

A bed’s capacity

Each bed is a resource under EHR → Administration → Resources, with a Capacity — normally 1. A bed holds no more patients than that.

• The Bed picker on an emergency visit shows each bed as Free or Occupied.
• Assigning a bed that is full is refused, and the message names the visit holding it, so you know whom to move or discharge.
• A bed is freed when its visit is closed with Disposition. Until then it stays occupied, even if the patient has physically left — which is why closing out visits matters.

Rooms and other resources booked in EHR → Administration → Scheduling are held to their capacity in the same way: a room for one cannot be booked twice for the same time.

Time in department

EHR → Emergency → Emergency Board and Emergency Visits show how long each patient has been in the department: in hours and minutes, or in days and hours for a long stay. Times are not added up into a total, which would mean nothing.

Closing out long stays

A visit open for more than 24 hours is flagged. Usually the patient was admitted, transferred or sent home and the visit was never closed. Open it, press Disposition and record what happened: the visit closes, and its bed is freed for the next patient.

Missed appointments

On Scheduling, an appointment whose time has passed with nobody checked in shows as "missed", so the day’s gaps are visible at a glance.

• The appointment itself is not changed. A patient who arrives late can still be checked in as normal.
• To record a no-show for good, open the appointment, choose Edit and set its Status.