Public Health Nursing Documentation Guidelines - Indian Health ...

Documentation and Coding Guidelines for Public Health Nurses
3.3 Setting Up a Clinic, Starting With PHN PRINCIPAL
The next step is to set up a PHN principal clinic definition. The PHN principal clinic
functions as the master clinic in reporting RPMS Patient Care Component reports
referencing all PHN clinics. No appointments are made to the principal clinic, nor is
it used to document PHN service. The principal clinic is helpful for the scheduling
package owners in the management of clinics in regards to reporting. When a report
is needed for all PHN clinics, only the name of the principal clinic is needed to access
all PHN information.
To improve PHN data collection, the use of the following process is recommended:
After choosing the Set Up a Clinic option in the Supervisor Menu (Figure 3.2b
above), the RPMS will ask the user to create a clinic name. “PHN PRINCIPAL” is
entered in Figure 3.3a below. In the next prompt, the user will be asked if PHN
PRINCIPAL will also serve as the hospital location. The correct answer is yes. At
the next prompt, the standard appointment length should be set at 30. The user
should understand that setting the appointment length here does not restrict all
public health nursing visits to 30 minutes.
Figure 3.3a. Clinic Name and Length of Appointment
Default options
RPMS offers default answers at some prompts. For example, in Figure 3.3a
above, the system gives “No” as a default answer to “Are you adding ‘PHN
PRINCIPAL’ as a new HOSPITAL LOCATION?” The two slash marks after
“No” signify a default answer. If the user simply hit return at this prompt
(instead of typing “YES”) the system would automatically enter “No.”
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