Appointments

February 2026 · 7 min

Overview

The Appointments module manages your clinic's schedule. You can book appointments for registered patients, view your daily/weekly calendar, manage time slots, and handle cancellations and rescheduling.

The system generates token numbers automatically, so patients know their queue position when they arrive.

Booking a New Appointment

Go to Appointments and click 'New Appointment'. Fill in:

1. Patient -- Search by name, phone, or Patient ID. If the patient is not registered, you can register them inline.
2. Doctor -- Select the consulting doctor (pre-filled in solo practice)
3. Department -- Auto-filled based on the doctor's department
4. Date -- Pick the appointment date from the calendar
5. Time slot -- Choose from available slots based on the doctor's schedule
6. Type -- OPD (outpatient), Follow-up, or Procedure
7. Reason -- Brief description of the visit reason (optional)

Click 'Confirm' to book. The patient gets a token number and the appointment appears on the doctor's calendar.

Managing Time Slots

Doctors' availability is configured under Settings > Schedules:

• Define working days (e.g., Monday to Saturday)
• Set morning and evening sessions with start/end times
• Configure slot duration (default: 15 minutes)
• Set maximum patients per slot
• Block specific dates for leave or holidays

Example schedule:

• Morning: 9:00 AM - 1:00 PM (16 slots at 15 min each)
• Evening: 5:00 PM - 8:00 PM (12 slots at 15 min each)
• Sunday: Closed

Walk-in Patients

Patients who arrive without an appointment can be added directly from the OPD Front Desk. The system creates an appointment record automatically and assigns the next available token number.

Walk-ins are marked differently in the queue so you can distinguish between scheduled and unscheduled patients.

Rescheduling and Cancellations

To reschedule, open the appointment and click 'Reschedule'. Select a new date and time slot. The original token number is released.

To cancel, open the appointment and click 'Cancel'. You can optionally add a cancellation reason. Cancelled appointments remain in the system for record-keeping but are marked with a strikethrough in the calendar.

Both actions are logged in the audit trail.

Appointment Status Flow

Each appointment moves through these statuses:

1. Scheduled -- Appointment booked, patient not yet arrived
2. Checked-in -- Patient has arrived at the clinic
3. In Progress -- Doctor has started the consultation
4. Completed -- Consultation finished
5. Cancelled -- Appointment was cancelled
6. No-show -- Patient did not arrive

The status updates automatically as the patient moves through the OPD workflow.

1Scheduled

Appointment booked and token reserved.

2Checked-in

Patient has arrived and is visible in the queue.

3In progress

Doctor has opened or started the consultation.

4Completed

Visit is finished and next actions move to billing or follow-up.

Control paths

CancelledNo-showRescheduled

Calendar Views

The appointment calendar supports three views:

• Day view -- See all appointments for a specific date with time slots
• Week view -- Overview of the entire week with color-coded appointment types
• List view -- Simple tabular list with sorting and filtering

All views support drag-and-drop rescheduling on desktop.

Recurring Appointments

For patients who need regular visits -- such as dialysis (3x/week), physiotherapy (daily), or chemotherapy cycles -- Bio Ecko supports recurring appointment series.

Creating a Recurring Series:

1. Click 'New Appointment' and toggle the 'Recurring' switch.
2. Select the recurrence pattern:
   • Daily -- Every day between start and end date
   • Weekly -- Select specific days of the week (e.g., Monday, Wednesday, Friday for dialysis)
   • Bi-weekly -- Alternating weeks on the chosen days
   • Monthly -- Same date each month
   • Custom -- Pick any combination of days
3. Set the start date and end date for the series.
4. All other fields (doctor, time, type) apply to every occurrence.
5. Click 'Create Series'. The system generates all appointments in one go.

Each appointment in a series shares a Recurring Group ID, so you can manage the entire series as a unit.

Managing a Recurring Series:

• Cancel entire series -- Opens the series manager where you can cancel all future appointments in the group with a single reason.
• Edit single occurrence -- Reschedule or cancel an individual appointment without affecting the rest of the series.
• View series -- Filter the calendar by Recurring Group ID to see all appointments in the series.

Recurring appointments are marked with a repeat icon in the calendar and list views.

Doctor Schedule Blocks

When a doctor is unavailable for a date range (leave, conference, etc.), you can block their schedule:

1. Go to Settings > Schedules and select the doctor.
2. Click 'Block Schedule'.
3. Enter the start date, end date, and reason.
4. The system prevents new bookings during blocked periods.
5. Existing appointments on blocked dates are flagged for review.

Blocked dates appear as shaded in the calendar and the slot-availability API returns zero available slots for those dates.

Slot Availability Check

Before booking, the system checks real-time slot availability:

1. The doctor's weekly schedule defines which days and time ranges they are available.
2. Existing bookings on the selected date are subtracted.
3. Blocked dates are excluded entirely.
4. The remaining open slots are returned as a list of available times.

This prevents double-booking and ensures patients are only offered genuinely available times. The slot duration is configurable per doctor (default: 15 minutes).

Notes

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