Cedar Lane Clinic

Overview

For a small clinic that books appointments, writes a short note at each visit and bills patients or their insurers. Cedar Lane Clinic is invented: two doctors, a practice nurse and two physiotherapists, with a reception desk that takes bookings by phone and online.

The records cover the year up to the day the file is made, and the weeks after it. Patients book a few days ahead. Some cancel and a few do not turn up, and the clinic charges a fee for some of those. A physiotherapy assessment leads to a course of weekly sessions, a health check sets a recall for a year later, and the doctors are busier in winter while the nurse is busiest in the autumn when flu vaccinations are given.

Each visit has an invoice, made out to the patient or, when the policy covers the service, to the insurer. Most patients pay at the desk; insurers pay within their terms, one of them slowly, so there is always something to chase. The saved queries answer what a practice manager asks each day and each month: who is booked this week, how full each diary is, who missed an appointment, who owes what, what came in, and which patients are due to be recalled.

It prints what the desk sends out: invoices numbered INV-2026-0042 (to an insurer with the patient's policy reference, or to the patient), receipts for payments, a letter confirming each appointment, a recall letter, and a statement of claims for each insurer. Medical care is exempt from VAT, so no VAT is charged and the invoices say so.

Every patient and every note in it is made up. The notes are short and ordinary on purpose; a real clinic keeps its own wording and its own rules on who may read them.

In Rutba Data Files, choose Clinic on the start screen, then With sample records to look around, or Empty for the same design with nothing in it.

It suits, with small changes

• A family doctor or GP practice that sees private patients
• A physiotherapy or sports injury practice
• A chiropractic or osteopathy clinic
• A dental surgery, with treatments in place of services
• A podiatry or foot care clinic
• A veterinary practice, with pets as patients and owners for contact details
• A counselling or talking therapy practice

Read on

• Tutorial: the everyday tasks: 6 everyday tasks, step by step, each naming what to open.
• Tables, fields and relationships: every field of 11 tables, and how they are related.
• Queries, forms, reports and print templates: what each one shows, its criteria and calculated columns, and when to print it.

Starting with your own records

Start with Business: the clinic's name, address, phone and bank details, which every invoice, receipt and letter prints. Then Insurers: add a Self-pay record first (Kind Self-pay), then each insurer you accept with its payment days. Then add your Practitioners with their hours, then your Services with their minutes and prices. Once those are in, register Patients, pointing each at an insurer or at Self-pay, and book Appointments. Write a Visit Note after each attended appointment, raise an Invoice for it, and record Payments as they arrive, updating the invoice's Amount Paid and Paid On. Add Recalls as visits call for them.

Questions people ask

Why does the invoice show no VAT?

Medical care is exempt from VAT in the UK, so the clinic charges none and is not registered. The invoice says so in its small print. If your services are taxed, put the rate in Business, Tax Rate, and the invoice adds it.

How do I bill an insurer instead of the patient?

On the invoice, set Bill To to Insurer, choose the Insurer, copy the insurer's claims address into the Bill To fields and the patient's Policy Reference into Policy Reference. The claim then appears on that insurer's statement.

A patient paid half now and half later. How do I record it?

Add two records in Payments, each pointing at the same invoice, each with its own receipt number. Add both to the invoice's Amount Paid; type Paid On on the invoice only when the second arrives.

How do I print last month's invoices?

Open the Invoices form, choose the invoices dated last month (sort by Invoice Date), and print the Invoice template for those chosen.

Can I change what the appointment letter says?

Yes. Open the Appointment letter template from Print templates and edit its text blocks. Words in curly brackets, such as {Start} or {Business.Phone}, are filled from the appointment and from the Business record.

How do I stop sending recall letters to someone?

Untick Reminders on their record in Patients. The Recall letters to send query leaves them out, and Recalls due still lists them so reception can ring instead.

What is the cancellation fee?

The sample charges half the fee for some missed appointments and cancellations with a day or less of notice, as an invoice with For set to Missed appointment or Late cancellation. Set your own rule and put it in the Business record's Document Footer, which every document prints.