If you offer pet boarding services, such as overnight stays, meals, exercise, and medical care, you can use the Provet Cloud boarding feature to manage your boarding visits. Boarding reservations and consultations are processed in a similar way to regular consultations - you can book reservations, check the patient in, manage the visit, and check the patient out. However, note that a boarding consultation is a simplified version of a regular consultation, and the consultation page does not include sections for referrals, diagnosis, clinical signs, diagnostics, and prescriptions.

To use the boarding functions, you need to set up a virtual user that is used for the boarding reservations and checking patients in and out. You also need to add your patient boarding locations and create the reasons and shift types that are used for boarding.

The boarding functionality must also be enabled if you want to use the pet service consultation type.

Setup

1. Create a virtual user for boarding events.

A virtual user is used for boarding reservations and checking patients in and out.

Go to Settings > Users and select New user.
Fill in the required and other relevant information. Add a name that users will recognise easily, such as 'Boarding user'.
Select the Virtual user checkbox.
Select Save.

2. Enable the boarding functionality.

Go to Settings > Department (Location) > Boarding.
Select the pen button to edit the settings.
Select the Enable boarding checkbox.
In the User for boarding check-in/check-out field, add the virtual user you created in step 1.
Select Save.

3. Add patient locations for boarding.

The patient locations for boarding are your individual rooms, kennels etc. used for boarding. The patient locations for boarding are added in the same settings as other patient locations you may be using.

You can also add attributes related to the different patient locations, for example, oxygen cage, padded walls, no bedding etc., and link these attributes to the locations.

a. Add patient location attributes

Note that you must create the patient location attributes before you can link them to the patient locations.

Go to Settings > Department (Location) > Patient locations.
In the Patient location attributes section, select Add attribute.
Add a descriptive name for the attribute.
Select Save.

The location attributes are listed in the Patient location attributes section. To edit an existing attribute, select the pen button at the end of the attribute row. To delete an attribute, select the trash bin button.

b. Add patient locations

Go to Settings > Department (Location) > Patient locations.
In the Patient locations section, select Add location.
Add the Location name, for example, 'Kennel A'.
Add the location Capacity.
Add the Attributes related to this location (created in the previous step).
Select the Boarding checkbox to make the location available for boarding. If this checkbox is not selected, the location is not listed in the available locations when creating a boarding reservation.
Select Save.

Add sub-locations

You can also create a patient location with sub-locations.

In the Patient locations section, select Add location.
Add the Location name for the parent location.
Select Add sub location.
Fill in the location information as in b. Add patient locations.
Select Add more sub locations if needed and repeat.
Select Save.

The locations are listed in the Patient locations section. To edit an existing location, select the pen button at the end of the location row. To delete a location, select the trash bin button.

4. Set up reasons and a shift type for boarding.

You need to set up reasons that are used for boarding reservation check-in and check-out appointments and a shift type to show the boarding events in your appointment calendar. You can set up the reasons and shift types in either order and link them together either in the reason or shift type settings.

a. Set up reason groups and reasons for boarding

Creating separate reasons for check-in and check-out appointments allows you to have different rules and confirmation messages for the check-in and check-out appointments used for the boarding stay.

Create a reason group

Go to Settings > Lists & Templates > Reasons.
In the Reason groups section, select Add.
Select the Department (Location) that the reason group will be used in.
Add a descriptive Name for the reason group, for example, 'Boarding'.
Select Save.

Create a reason

Go to Settings > Lists & Templates > Reasons.
In the Reasons section, select Add.
Add a descriptive Name for the reason, for example, 'Dog boarding'.
Select the Available for boarding checkbox.
Fill in any other required or relevant information. For more information, see Add Appointment Reasons.
If you have already created a shift type for boarding, select it in the Shift types field. If not, you can create a shift type later and link the reason to the shift type also in the shift type settings.
Select Save.

b. Set up a shift type for boarding

Go to Settings > Department (Location) > Shift types and select Add.
Add a descriptive Name for the shift, for example, 'Boarding calendar'.
If you have already created your boarding reasons, select them in the Reason types field. If not, you can create boarding reasons later and link the shift type to the reasons also in the reason settings.
Add any other required or relevant information and select Active so that the shift will be available.
Select Save.

Video Overview

You can watch this video for instructions on how to set up and build your boarding calendar workflow.

Boarding Overview and Setup