Messaging 

Messaging lets you send text, light, and sound messages between computers in the office. The "light buttons" are in the lower portion of the main left toolbar.

All of the functionality and colors are completely customizable. The example above is how the buttons might be setup for Op 1. If the Dr needs the assistant, they would push the top button which would cause the Op 1 button to turn pink on all computers in the office. Likewise, if an assistant need the Dr, they would push the second button down, causing the Op 1 button to turn blue in all rooms.

The initial instinct of someone learning the system is to try to push the Op 1 button itself to turn it on. This does not work for two reasons:
1. You want to have the Op 1 button light up with a different color based on who you are calling. If you push the Op 1 button, the program will not know who you are calling.
2. You frequently cannot remember which room you're in. It's much easier to get in the habit of always hitting the "top" button no matter which room you're in to call someone into that room.

The PtReady button is intended to be used by the front desk when a patient is ready to go back to the room. Click it to turn it on, and click it again to turn it off. The PhAssist button might be used in some offices. If the person answering the phone is already on the phone, and it rings again, they can click this button to request help from a backup person. This only works if each computer has the sound turned up.

To cancel (acknowledge) a button that is lit, click on the lit button.

The lower half of the Manage module is used for sending more complex messages.

You would typically just click one item from each column to sent a message. For example: (to) Doctor - (from) Assistant - Spouse - Line 1. When you click an item in the last column, Line 1 in the example, the message is immediately sent to all computers in the office along with corresponding lights and sound. In the example, a voice on the other computers would say, "Doctor, Spouse, Line 1." The 'from' user does not trigger a sound. If, instead, you want to send a text message, you would click on the To and From columns as usual, and then type in a message at the bottom and click Send Text. The only sound that would go out would the the name of the person you were sending the message to. They would have to go to this screen on their computer to see and acknowledge the message.

Received messages always show in the grid at the right. Every message should eventually be acknowledged in some way. If it's a light signal, then the acknowledgement consists of turning off the light. If it's a text message, then it gets acknowledged by using the Ack button after selecting one or more messages to ack. Ack'd messages are not generally shown on the list since nobody cares about them anymore. But if you do want to see an old message, check the box at the top for "Include Acknowledged." Usually, all users are shown in the list, but you can change the user at the upper right to just show your own messages and not anyone else's. This would only be used if you start using the messaging feature heavily for to do lists. If your needs grow beyond what messaging can handle, consider using the Task Lists instead, which are not as immediate, but can handle a much larger load.

Setup

To setup your lists, in the Main Menu, select Setup | Messaging.

The first column, Users, is shared by both the To and From columns in the Manage module. Click Add, or double click on a list item to edit.

The type lets you move an element to another column if you wish. The text is what shows in the lists.

Sounds

The sound area lets you attach a sound to this element. If a sound is already attached, you can click the play button to hear it, or the delete button to clear it. The sound is typically just someone saying the text of the element. But it takes a little bit of work to get the recording just right. To record your own sound, click the Launch Recorder button.

You should get a standalone microphone that plugs into your computer. Talk into the microphone in a quick clear voice without letting air blow on the microphone. Try to speak in a medium loud voice. If you want the sound to fit in with the existing sounds from other elements, you will need to practice to get the loudness correct. When you are ready, hit the record button and talk. Then hit the stop button. The time consuming part is trimming the beginning and end off the sound so that there is not annoying dead space. First, trim off the beginning. Test and adjust your estimated beginning repeatedly to make sure it will not get clipped at all. Once you know exactly where to trim, to go the Edit menu and click "Delete Before Current Position". Then, carefully do the same for the end. The end is very sensitive to clipping. The trailing sound can extend 0.10 to 0.20 seconds beyond its obvious end. Make sure to include the whole thing.

Save your sound in a temporary location as a .wav file. Then, use the import button in Open Dental to attach the sound to the message element and save it in the database.

Lights Versus Buttons

The "light buttons" at the lower left of the main screen serve two separate functions, which it is very important to keep separate conceptually. One function is lights, and the other is buttons. For setup purposes, they are completely different and separate setups.

Lights: In the Edit Message Element window above, you are only setting up the light function, not the button function. Lights are responses to certain message elements that are received. The message could come in from the user clicking items in the Manage module, or from clicking the "light buttons". But the user might push the third button which sends a message that triggers a light on the seventh button. The light setting refers to the button that lights up, not the one that they push. Lights always light up exactly the same on all computers.

When assigning colors and rows to lights, remember that colors usually belong to users, and rows usually belong to locations in the office. So a user would normally get a color, but not a row. A location would normally get a row but not a color.

Buttons: When you push a "light button" you are just using a shortcut that is the equivalent of clicking a sequence of items in the Manage module. You are not necessarily turning on the light on the button you push, although it is common to do so. Pushing a button does not need to trigger any light at all, or it can trigger multiple lights.

To setup Messaging buttons, from the Main Menu, select Setup | Messaging buttons.

All of the computers in the office are listed in the left column. There may be extra computers listed that you no longer use. That doesn't hurt anything, but you can get rid of them by editing your Computers under Main Menu | Setup | Computers. The computer that you are currently on is indicated by (this computer). Whichever computer you have highlighted determines the button list that you will see on the right. Most buttons will be the same for all computers, so set those up with "All" selected for the computer column on the left. But some buttons change depending on the room your are in. Remember that the lights will always light up exactly the same on all computers; you cannot change this. What you are changing is how the buttons react to clicking. Use the example above and the description at the very top of this page to get you started.

The Synch Icon refers to the 3 x 3 grid in the main program icon. The cells are numbered 1-9 right to left, starting with the top row and working down. So the top row is 1-3, second row is 4-6, and bottom row is 7-9. The color will be the same as the light in the normal grid. The reason for this is so that if Open Dental is covered by another program, that you will still be able to see the light come on in the taskbar. It's small, but it's still visible.