Slot | Medplum
A slot of time on a schedule that may be available for booking appointments.
Elements
| Name | Required | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| identifier | Identifier[] | External Ids for this item Details External Ids for this item. |
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| serviceCategory | CodeableConcept[] | A broad categorization of the service that is to be performed during this appointment Details A broad categorization of the service that is to be performed during this appointment. |
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| serviceType | CodeableConcept[] | The type of appointments that can be booked into this slot (ideally this would be an identifiable service - which is at a location, rather than the location itself). If provided then this overrides the value provided on the availability resource Details The type of appointments that can be booked into this slot (ideally this would be an identifiable service - which is at a location, rather than the location itself). If provided then this overrides the value provided on the availability resource. |
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| specialty | CodeableConcept[] | The specialty of a practitioner that would be required to perform the service requested in this appointment Details The specialty of a practitioner that would be required to perform the service requested in this appointment. |
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| appointmentType | CodeableConcept | The style of appointment or patient that may be booked in the slot (not service type) Details The style of appointment or patient that may be booked in the slot (not service type). |
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| schedule | ✓ | Reference<Schedule> | The schedule resource that this slot defines an interval of status information Details The schedule resource that this slot defines an interval of status information. |
| status | ✓ | code | busy | free | busy-unavailable | busy-tentative | entered-in-error Details busy | free | busy-unavailable | busy-tentative | entered-in-error. |
| start | ✓ | instant | Date/Time that the slot is to begin Details Date/Time that the slot is to begin. |
| end | ✓ | instant | Date/Time that the slot is to conclude Details Date/Time that the slot is to conclude. |
| overbooked | boolean | This slot has already been overbooked, appointments are unlikely to be accepted for this time Details This slot has already been overbooked, appointments are unlikely to be accepted for this time. |
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| comment | string | Comments on the slot to describe any extended information. Such as custom constraints on the slot Details Comments on the slot to describe any extended information. Such as custom constraints on the slot. |
Search Parameters
| Name | Type | Description | Expression |
|---|---|---|---|
| appointment-type | token | The style of appointment or patient that may be booked in the slot (not service type) | Slot.appointmentType |
| identifier | token | A Slot Identifier | Slot.identifier |
| schedule | reference | The Schedule Resource that we are seeking a slot within | Slot.schedule |
| service-category | token | A broad categorization of the service that is to be performed during this appointment | Slot.serviceCategory |
| service-type | token | The type of appointments that can be booked into the slot | Slot.serviceType |
| specialty | token | The specialty of a practitioner that would be required to perform the service requested in this appointment | Slot.specialty |
| start | date | Appointment date/time. | Slot.start |
| status | token | The free/busy status of the appointment | Slot.status |
| end | date | The end time of the Slot | Slot.end |
Inherited Elements
| Name | Required | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| id | string | Logical id of this artifact Details The logical id of the resource, as used in the URL for the resource. Once assigned, this value never changes. The only time that a resource does not have an id is when it is being submitted to the server using a create operation. |
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| meta | Meta | Metadata about the resource Details The metadata about the resource. This is content that is maintained by the infrastructure. Changes to the content might not always be associated with version changes to the resource. |
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| implicitRules | uri | A set of rules under which this content was created Details A reference to a set of rules that were followed when the resource was constructed, and which must be understood when processing the content. |
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| language | code | Language of the resource content Details The base language in which the resource is written. |
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| text | Narrative | Text summary of the resource, for human interpretation Details A human-readable narrative that contains a summary of the resource and can be used to represent the content of the resource to a human. |
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| contained | Resource[] | Contained, inline Resources Details These resources do not have an independent existence apart from the resource that contains them - they cannot be identified independently, and nor can they have their own independent transaction scope. |
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| extension | Extension[] | Additional content defined by implementations Details May be used to represent additional information that is not part of the basic definition of the resource. |
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| modifierExtension | Extension[] | Extensions that cannot be ignored Details May be used to represent additional information that is not part of the basic definition of the resource and that modifies the understanding of the element that contains it and/or the understanding of the containing element's descendants. |
Slot resources are used to provide time-slots that can be booked using an appointment. They do not provide any information about appointments that are available, just the time, and optionally what the time can be used for. These are effectively spaces of free/busy time.
Slots can also be marked as busy without having appointments associated.
A slot can have more than one appointment allocated to it. A scheduling system may permit multiple allocations up to a specific number of places. An example of this type of usage could be where the slot is being used for a group service that permits 5 participants at the same time.
A slot can be marked as over-booked indicating that there are too many appointments allocated to it.
In some situations a service may have a specific set of slots reserved for specific uses, such as "walk-ins" or a specific organization has a "standing booking" for Thursday mornings. These should be represented using the appointmentType field with a specified and agreed value.
Security Permissions or specific business rules on the system could enforce that only eligible appointments are allocated to them.
If a service had a weekly schedule created that permitted eight 1 hour appointments each day of a working week (Monday - Friday), this would be constructed by a single Schedule resource with the dates for the start and end of the week set, and then 40 (5x8) Slot resources associated with it.
As appointments fill up the schedule, these slots would individually be marked as busy as the appointments are filled into the slots.
The slots in a schedule do not need to be the same size, and can be different for different days of the week.
Slot instances do not have any recurrence information included. If recurring information is desired, this will be managed outside these resources, or included as extensions.
Note that booking an appointment does not necessarily require that slot resources be identified. When attempting to book an appointment, if the requestor knows ahead of time which schedulable resources are required, then identifying individual slots from the resources' schedules prior to creating the appointment is appropriate. However, in some medical scheduling scenarios, determining which resources are required for an appointment is very complex, and options other than using schedule+slot may be a better solution.