To Generate an Outgoing Letter

This describes how to generate a letter from your practice to an external source.

1. Select Add – Correspondence to display the Clinical Correspondence – Add screen.
2. Click within the Summary box and type, in free text, a resumé of its contents.
3. Remove the tick from Third Party Letter.
4. The tick should remain in In Practice, to show this is a letter from your practice.
5. Type of Letter - Referral (the default); the options are: <None>, Clinical, Invoice, Medical Report, Patient, Practice, Recall, Referral.
6. Click on the letter icon (on either Clinical Correspondence, Referrals or Recalls), in order to generate an outgoing letter.
7. Select the letter template - this depends on which word processor you have chosen to use and where you have stored it. (In Options Setup on the Vision front Menu, you can choose either Word or Vision Editor as the word processor).

   The recommended directory for storing templates is p:\wordproc\template which should be displayed by default. If not, double click on p:\ then wordproc, then template. Creating and storing template letters is explained in the Recalls and Patient Groups User Guide.

   Once merged with a patient details, the letters are stored in a different directory p:\wordproc\clincorr and given the extension of *.cli for Vision Editor, or .doc and docx for Word.

8. The letter type you have chosen will determine the letter that displays for merging. Choose the template letter you want.

   Template letters written in Word will carry the file names you gave them, but by convention, with the extension on .doc or docx.

   Template Vision Editor letters: Vision Editor letters have a file extension of .txwWhen creating template letters, it makes sense tosave them with a clue in the title as to their type, eg refer1.txw, recall2.txw

9. Once the body of the letter displays, you will see the merged fields now have this patient's details. You can delete merged fields if required. Type and edit in the relevant text of the letter as you wish.

   Note - If you are copying text from Vision, you will need to copy it to the clipboard before you start the letter (see below - To copy text into an outgoing letter:).

10. Once the letter text is complete, select File, Print to print the letter.
11. There is no need to save the letter as this is done automatically. Select File, Exit and return to the Clinical Correspondence screen.
12. The letter icon will now be ticked . Click on OK.

If you want to view the letter later, first display a list of letters from Correspondence on the List menu. Point to the relevant correspondence line, click with the right mouse button and select either Item View (display only) or Edit. Then click on the letter icon .

In this section To Copy Text into an Outgoing Letter: