Appointment Locations vs State Licenses
Healthie's calendar supports the ability to add both Appointment Locations and State Licenses. These concepts sound similar but end up being used in distinct ways to accomplish different objectives.
Appointment Locations
Appointment Locations are specific (normally physical) locations where a specific appointment with an “In-Person” contact type will be conducted. These Appointment Locations are configured under settings -> appointment locations. Learn more about adjusting appointment locations. An Appointment Location can be a full address (e.g 1407 Broadway, New York, New York, 10019) but do not have to be (e.g “Office A” or “Fresno Campus”).
Appointment locations are tied to a specific appointment when the appointment is booked, and are not tied directly to an appointment type or provider. However, you can limit which locations a provider can be scheduled for on a given day via our “Availability by Location” setting. This setting is commonly used if your providers travel to different locations (e.g they will be at the “Fresno Campus” on Tuesdays and Thursdays and “Palo Alto Campus” on Mondays and Wednesdays).
State Licensure Information
State Licenses allow you to track which providers are licensed to practice in which U.S state (e.g Provider “Jane Doe” is licensed in “NY’, “MA”, and “CA”). This state license feature can be relevant no matter the contact type of the appointment, and is commonly used by companies delivering virtual car in multiple states. It can be used to ensure that patients are not scheduling with providers who are not legally able to provide care to the patient.
State licenses are configured via the API (via the `updateOrganizationMember` mutation) or by data load. The convenience feature to allow configuration of them directly in the Healthie UI is being made available in mid-August. Once you have configured professional state licenses for your providers, and listed which appointment types require a state-licensed provider, then our Availability Algorithm will take the state licenses into account when generating potential availability.
1) For professional state licensure and tags for team members, those are both currently done via the API. It is the `updateOrganizationMember` and `createTag` mutations respectively.
Professional state licenses and appointment locations can be used in conjunction with each other, and are not exclusive. Many Healthie users will not need the professional state license or appointment location functionality, while others will utilize these features as key pieces of their Healthie set-up. Here are some common things to look for to know if these features are relevant, and which one you should be using when.
Utilizing Appointment & Professional State Licenses
You should consider using appointment locations if:
- You provide (at least some) in-person care
You should consider using state licenses if:
- Your business provides virtual-first care in multiple states
- The type of care requires that a healthcare provider be licensed in the specific state
- You want to include these restrictions in patient self-scheduling, so that they are automatically enforced