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Healthquest Resources
Alberta Health Physician's Resource Guide
*Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Alberta
How-to Videos
We have a number of amazing videos to help you get the most out of Healthquest. From scheduling to charting to billing, we have you covered!
Frequently Asked Questions
The Healthquest Patient Portal is a set of fully integrated, patient-centered virtual care tools.
For clinic staff and physicians, the Patient Portal will add new patient messaging functions in Healthquest. For the patients, the Patient Portal is a secure webpage, accessible from any web-enabled device.
Together, the Healthquest Patient Portal gives your patients the ability to communicate securely with your clinic – their medical home – anytime, anywhere.
To get the Healthquest Patient Portal set up for your clinic, contact our Technical Support team toll-free at 1-866-438-3762.
Or contact us online at https://www.healthquest.ca/contact-us/.
On April 28, 2020, the Healthquest Patient Portal was released with Patient Messaging available. Patient Messaging allows clinics, healthcare providers, and patients to communicate securely with each other.
Virtual Appointments (videoconferencing) were added to the Healthquest Patient Portal in late May. Virtual Appointments allows you to visit with your patients virtually and remotely, ensuring the continuity of care in the stay home, stay safe era.
You bet! The Healthquest Patient Portal is fully integrated with Healthquest. Clinics and healthcare providers initiate patient messages from within Healthquest. Patients access the web-based portion of the Patient Portal to send messages to the clinic.
Every message sent between a clinic, healthcare provider, and a patient is automatically added to a patient’s chart.
The Healthquest Patient Portal is free of charge until September 2020.
Post-pandemic pricing will be available shortly and will be competitive with other solutions in the market.
Yes. As per section 64(1) of the Health Information Act (HIA):
"Each custodian must prepare a privacy impact assessment that describes how proposed administrative practices and information systems relating to the collection, use and disclosure of individually identifying health information may affect the privacy of the individual who is the subject of the information."
To help make this step easier for our clients, Microquest has prepared a Healthquest Online PIA Amendment template, which our clients can fill out and submit to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta (OIPC).
To obtain the Healthquest Online PIA Amendment template, click here.
Yes. As a regulated service compliant with the HIA and the OIPC, virtual care provided via the Healthquest Patient Portal can be billed using Alberta Health’s virtual fee codes.
For more information on these fee codes, please visit https://www.albertadoctors.org/leaders-partners/ehealth/virtual-care#codes.
There are a few ways to invite your patients to the Healthquest Patient Portal. First, we’ve added the ability to send an individual patient an invite from their client card.
Additionally, you can also use the Client Lists Manager to send an invite to multiple patients. With this method, you can create a customized list of patients. For example, you can create a list of patients from your panel only and send an invite to only those patients.
Currently, each individual accessing the Healthquest Patient Portal must have a unique email address.
Family and caregiver access will be added in a future release.
After receiving your invite, patients will access the Healthquest Patient Portal’s registration page. They’ll create their login information, and sign into the Healthquest Patient Portal for the first time.
Any time after that, all they’ll need to do is visit the secure Healthquest Patient Portal site again, and sign back in.
No apps to download. Just a secure website accessible from any web-enabled device!
Every message from a patient is sent to a shared clinic inbox. The new Patient Messaging section of the Sidebar will indicate if any new messages have arrived.
Every Healthquest user will have access to this clinic inbox. From the clinic inbox, staff can either respond to the message directly or assign it to a specific physician for later review and response.
Once a message has been assigned to a specific physician, the Sidebar will indicate how many new messages have been assigned. Additionally, physician-assigned messages can be accessed via the Patient Messaging tab in the Doctor View.
Patients will receive a notification email shortly after receiving a new message. Notifications are sent to the email address they used to register for the Healthquest Patient Portal.
If the patient is currently logged into the Healthquest Patient Portal when a new message is received, they will not receive a notification email. Instead, the new message will appear with bold text in the message list.
At this time, only clinic staff and physicians can send attachments to patients.
Clinic staff and physicians can attach Chart Notes, Forms, Intake Forms, Lab Results, Letters, Medications, Problems, and Scans to any message.
The ability for patients to attach documents to a message will be added in a future release.
Well, that’s done automatically! Since every patient accessing the Healthquest Patient Portal is linked to a patient within Healthquest, all communication between the clinic and the patient is recorded in the new Patient Messaging section of their chart.
How great is that?!
Healthquest Patient Portal FAQs
The Healthquest Patient Portal is a set of fully integrated, patient-centered virtual care tools.
For clinic staff and physicians, the Patient Portal will add new patient messaging functions in Healthquest. For the patients, the Patient Portal is a secure webpage, accessible from any web-enabled device.
Together, the Healthquest Patient Portal gives your patients the ability to communicate securely with your clinic – their medical home – anytime, anywhere.
To get the Healthquest Patient Portal set up for your clinic, contact our Technical Support team toll-free at 1-866-438-3762.
Or contact us online at https://www.healthquest.ca/contact-us/.
On April 28, 2020, the Healthquest Patient Portal was released with Patient Messaging available. Patient Messaging allows clinics, healthcare providers, and patients to communicate securely with each other.
Virtual Appointments (videoconferencing) were added to the Healthquest Patient Portal in late May. Virtual Appointments allows you to visit with your patients virtually and remotely, ensuring the continuity of care in the stay home, stay safe era.
You bet! The Healthquest Patient Portal is fully integrated with Healthquest. Clinics and healthcare providers initiate patient messages from within Healthquest. Patients access the web-based portion of the Patient Portal to send messages to the clinic.
Every message sent between a clinic, healthcare provider, and a patient is automatically added to a patient’s chart.
The Healthquest Patient Portal is free of charge until September 2020.
Post-pandemic pricing will be available shortly and will be competitive with other solutions in the market.
Yes. As per section 64(1) of the Health Information Act (HIA):
"Each custodian must prepare a privacy impact assessment that describes how proposed administrative practices and information systems relating to the collection, use and disclosure of individually identifying health information may affect the privacy of the individual who is the subject of the information."
To help make this step easier for our clients, Microquest has prepared a Healthquest Online PIA Amendment template, which our clients can fill out and submit to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta (OIPC).
To obtain the Healthquest Online PIA Amendment template, click here.
Yes. As a regulated service compliant with the HIA and the OIPC, virtual care provided via the Healthquest Patient Portal can be billed using Alberta Health’s virtual fee codes.
For more information on these fee codes, please visit https://www.albertadoctors.org/leaders-partners/ehealth/virtual-care#codes.
There are a few ways to invite your patients to the Healthquest Patient Portal. First, we’ve added the ability to send an individual patient an invite from their client card.
Additionally, you can also use the Client Lists Manager to send an invite to multiple patients. With this method, you can create a customized list of patients. For example, you can create a list of patients from your panel only and send an invite to only those patients.
Currently, each individual accessing the Healthquest Patient Portal must have a unique email address.
Family and caregiver access will be added in a future release.
After receiving your invite, patients will access the Healthquest Patient Portal’s registration page. They’ll create their login information, and sign into the Healthquest Patient Portal for the first time.
Any time after that, all they’ll need to do is visit the secure Healthquest Patient Portal site again, and sign back in.
No apps to download. Just a secure website accessible from any web-enabled device!
Every message from a patient is sent to a shared clinic inbox. The new Patient Messaging section of the Sidebar will indicate if any new messages have arrived.
Every Healthquest user will have access to this clinic inbox. From the clinic inbox, staff can either respond to the message directly or assign it to a specific physician for later review and response.
Once a message has been assigned to a specific physician, the Sidebar will indicate how many new messages have been assigned. Additionally, physician-assigned messages can be accessed via the Patient Messaging tab in the Doctor View.
Patients will receive a notification email shortly after receiving a new message. Notifications are sent to the email address they used to register for the Healthquest Patient Portal.
If the patient is currently logged into the Healthquest Patient Portal when a new message is received, they will not receive a notification email. Instead, the new message will appear with bold text in the message list.
At this time, only clinic staff and physicians can send attachments to patients.
Clinic staff and physicians can attach Chart Notes, Forms, Intake Forms, Lab Results, Letters, Medications, Problems, and Scans to any message.
The ability for patients to attach documents to a message will be added in a future release.
Well, that’s done automatically! Since every patient accessing the Healthquest Patient Portal is linked to a patient within Healthquest, all communication between the clinic and the patient is recorded in the new Patient Messaging section of their chart.
How great is that?!
Connect Care FAQs
Connect Care is an Alberta Health Services initiative to provide a shared provincial clinical information system used by AHS clinicians in AHS facilities.
From our discussions with AHS, it is our understanding that Connect Care will be a direct replacement for eClinician; that is, anywhere that eClinician is currently used will transition to Connect Care.
Connect Care will be in place everywhere AHS provides healthcare services and where AHS partners to provide healthcare services using the AHS record of care. This includes hospitals, clinics, AHS-run community health sites, CapitalCare, Covenant Health, Calgary Laboratory Services locations, and DynaLIFE locations.
Source: https://www.albertahealthservices.ca/assets/info/cis/if-cis-cc-community-provider-update-2019-08.pdf
For Healthquest users who do not work in an AHS facility, no, Connect Care will not be replacing Healthquest as your EMR.
Connect Care will be implemented only in AHS facilities — everywhere AHS provides healthcare services and where AHS partners to provide healthcare services using the AHS record of care.
For Healthquest users in AHS facilities, it is our understanding that you can continue to use Healthquest for claim submissions and letters/dictations as we don’t believe these services will be provided by AHS/Connect Care.
Healthquest users will not be required to switch to Connect Care to access patient information collected in an AHS facility.
Alberta Netcare
According to AHS, Netcare will be upgraded to collect information from Connect Care (emergency department summaries, in-hospital consultations) and CPAR/CII.
eDelivery
According to AHS: “if you are receiving at least one result type via eDelivery today, you will be set up to receive all of the Connect Care results available by eDelivery in the future.”
Multiple Patient Charts?
According to AHS: “Patient information will continue to reside in your community EMR, in Netcare, and in Connect Care, but there will be more common information available between them.”
Essentially, your patient could have a chart in your Healthquest database, and a chart in Connect Care at an AHS facility. For example, one of your patients could visit an AHS emergency department where their information could be recorded in that facility’s Connect Care.
This information (such as emergency department summaries and in-hospital consultations) will still be accessible via Netcare, and Healthquest will continue to access Netcare as it does now.
Sources: https://www.albertahealthservices.ca/assets/info/cis/if-cis-cc-the-evolving-alberta-health-information-system-faq.pdf | https://www.albertahealthservices.ca/assets/info/cis/if-cis-cc-community-provider-update-2019-08.pdf
Nothing! Microquest will automatically add your ID to Healthquest once you receive a result from the new Connect Care eDelivery feed. No need to call support or figure out how to add the ID yourself; we’ll take care of it for you!
The new requisitions for APL and DynaLIFE requisitions will be available in Healthquest once they are available from AHS and DynaLIFE. As well, Healthquest will automatically populate your Connect Care ID when using the new requisitions.