patienttype

Patienttype is a data field used in healthcare information systems to classify patients according to the nature of their encounter or care pathway. It informs clinical workflows, resource allocation, billing, and reporting, and supports analytics on patient flow and service use. Categories vary by organization and country but commonly include inpatient, outpatient, emergency, observation, day surgery, maternity or newborn, pediatric, adult, home health, telemedicine or virtual visit, hospice or palliative care, and long-term care.

In electronic health records, patienttype is typically stored on the encounter or admission record and may interact with admission type (elective, urgent, emergent) and discharge status. It helps determine bed assignment, length of stay calculations, and whether services are billed as inpatient or outpatient. The value can influence scheduling, care coordination, and the allocation of diagnostic or therapeutic resources during a visit or admission.

Standards and interoperability play a role, as many systems map patienttype to standardized vocabularies such as SNOMED CT concepts and HL7 messaging, and integration with billing codes (ICD-10-CM, CPT) requires consistent definitions. Data governance is important to maintain uniform use across departments and facilities.

Considerations for implementation include clear, documented definitions, ongoing staff training to assign the correct value, and procedures for edge cases such as patient transfers between care settings. The term is sometimes referred to as patient class, visit type, or admission type, and implementations can vary, necessitating mapping and alignment when exchanging data between systems.