Skip to content
ManageCal
Open app

For clinics and practices

Who is in which room, and when, without putting every booking on show.

A clinic shares rooms between practitioners and a front desk between everyone. ManageCal shows reception who is free and which room is taken, and keeps the detail of each booking to the people who need it.

The problems

Three problems every shared practice has.

01

Two practitioners, one treatment room

A room shared by a physiotherapist in the morning and an osteopath in the afternoon works until the morning runs late and the afternoon starts early. Somebody finds out in the corridor.

Give each room a sub-calendar that refuses overlapping events. A booking that would put two people in the room at once is refused when it is saved, and repeating clinics are checked for clashes across the coming year, not just their first week.

TuesdayRooms
09:0011:0013:0015:0017:00
Treatment Room 1
09:00Nurse clinic
14:00Podiatry
Treatment Room 2
08:30Physiotherapy
11:00OsteopathyRefused
13:00Osteopathy
Consulting Room
10:00Team huddle

The morning overrun would have put two practitioners in Room 2. It is refused on save.

02

Reception needs to know someone is busy, not why

The front desk has to answer “is she free at three?” all day. It does not need the reason for every booking to answer it, and in a clinic the reason is exactly what should stay private.

Give reception “no details” access to each practitioner’s calendar. They see the time is taken and the booking reads Reserved. The title, the notes and every field are withheld by the server, so they never reach reception’s browser, and a search for a name finds nothing.

Tuesday, as reception sees itPractitioners
09:0011:0013:0015:0017:00
Physiotherapy
08:30Reserved
10:30Reserved
Osteopathy
13:00Reserved
15:30Reserved
Nursing
09:00Reserved

Reception can see who is free at three o’clock without learning what anyone is doing.

03

A weekly clinic with the odd week off

A Wednesday clinic runs every week of the year except the ones it does not. Make it one repeating event and change or skip single weeks as they come up: a bank holiday is skipped, a week in a different room is changed, and the series carries on.

Because the series is one record, a change to every future week, a new start time from January, say, is one edit rather than fifty.

Wednesday clinicWeekly
7 OctClinic
14 OctClinic in Room 3Changed
21 OctClinic
28 OctClinic
4 NovSkipped
11 NovClinic

One week moved to Room 3, one skipped, and the rest unchanged.

A starting set-up

A calendar a practice could start with.

Rooms and practitioners as separate sub-calendars, so a booking can sit on both: the practitioner’s diary and the room they are using. Editing it then needs write access to both, which is what stops a room being taken by someone who cannot book it.

Rooms refuse overlaps
Practitioners’ own calendars do not need to: a room is where the clash matters.
Notes are editors-only
A field can be visible only to people who can edit the booking, and is withheld from everyone else.
Keep identifiers out
Use session types and initials rather than full patient details. A calendar is not a clinical record.
PracticeSuggested set-up
Rooms
  • Treatment Room 1No overlaps
  • Treatment Room 2No overlaps
  • Consulting RoomNo overlaps
Practitioners
  • Physiotherapy
  • Osteopathy
  • Nursing
Practice
  • Team Meetings
  • Training
  • Time Off
Custom fields
  • PractitionerText
  • Session TypeChoice
  • Follow-up NeededCheckbox
  • NotesFormatted text, editors only
Who sees what

A practice manager, a physiotherapist and reception, on the same Tuesday.

The practice manager sees everything. Each practitioner manages their own diary and reads the rooms. Reception sees when every practitioner is busy, and nothing more.

Practice managerAdministrator
Tue 13
09:00Assessment
12:00Practice meeting
14:00Treatment

Every diary, every detail.

PhysiotherapistModify my events
Tue 13
09:00Assessment
12:00Practice meeting

Their own diary in full. Colleagues’ diaries are not shared.

ReceptionRead only, no details
Tue 13
09:00Reserved
14:00Reserved

Knows who is busy and when, and nothing else.

PhysiotherapyOsteopathyTeam Meetings
Questions

What clinics ask before they start.

Is ManageCal a patient booking system?

No. Patients do not book online through it and it sends them nothing. It is the practice’s internal calendar: rooms, practitioners, clinics and the running of the place.

Should patient details go into bookings?

Keep them to a minimum. ManageCal withholds details from anyone without access, but it is a scheduling calendar, not a clinical record system, and it holds no healthcare-specific certification. Initials and a session type are usually enough to run the day.

Can each practitioner see only their own diary?

Yes. Access is set per person on each sub-calendar, and a sub-calendar someone has not been given does not appear for them at all.

Can reception book on a practitioner’s behalf without reading their diary?

Yes. Add only, no details lets someone add bookings to a calendar while every existing booking reads Reserved to them, including the ones they added.

Can one booking hold both the practitioner and the room?

Yes. Assign it to the practitioner’s sub-calendar and the room’s, and it appears on both, once. The room still refuses a clash, and changing the booking needs write access to both calendars, so nobody can take a room they are not allowed to book.

What happens when a practitioner leaves?

Hide their sub-calendar rather than deleting it. Their past bookings stay, out of everyone’s way, and come back if you restore it.

Read next
Get started

Put your whole organisation on one calendar.

Set up your sub-calendars, decide who sees what, and start scheduling.

Open ManageCal