Patient Care Centers in PCC Software

If your practice has multiple locations that operate independently, you may qualify to use the Care Center features in PCC software. Care centers are groups of one or more locations that operate independently or semi-independently within a larger practice structure. Care centers may share a central billing office, practice owner, and policies. Or care centers may function like a network of practice partnerships under one larger group identity.


The Care Center features can help large practices or multiple-practice partnerships in which different office locations operate independently.

Once Care Center features are turned on, you can assign patients and staff to a specific care center within your group practice. When you assign a patient to a care center, a care center location flag is added to the patient’s record and new features become available in PCC EHR, pocketPCC, and the patient portal.

Read below to learn more.

Filter Patient Searches by Care Centers

When you search for a patient chart in PCC EHR, pocketPCC, or Patient Portal Administration, you can see the patient’s care center in the search results.

Use Care Centers to Search for Patients in PCC EHR

Staff at any office location can open any patient’s chart. You can search for patients with the Find field in the upper-left corner of PCC EHR.


The Care Center Column helps you find the correct patient.

You can use the Care Center filter to see only patients at the care center where you work.

Use Care Centers to Search for Patients in pocketPCC

When you use the Find patient search field in pokcetPCC, the patient’s care center displays, along with other details.

To filter the results by the patient’s care center, click the gear icon in the upper-right corner. Then select the care center that you wish to view.

Use Care Centers to Search for Patients in Patient Portal Administration

When you search for patients to add to a portal user’s account, the care center information for each patient displays in your search results.

Use the Care Center column to correctly identify the patients to add for each patient portal user.

The portal login URL at the bottom of the Patient Portal Administration window displays the associated care center location for the individual EHR user who is currently logged in to PCC EHR.

Review a Patient’s Care Center While You Work

When a patient is assigned to a care center, the care center information displays in Patient Demographics wherever the component is present, including during patient check-in and when creating a new patient.

To view a patient’s care center during scheduling, click the “Details” button in the Appointment Book to view demographics in the Patient Details window.

Filter Messaging Queue Tasks By Care Center

When your practice uses the Care Center features, the Messaging queue’s Location filter allows you to limit your queue by care center.

Use the Location filter to see messages that relate only to the care center location where you work.

By default, incoming new messages and phone tasks on the Messaging queue will be associated with the patient’s care center.

If a nurse creates a phone message task, as shown above, or a physician creates an order follow-up task, the task will be associated with the patient’s care center.

However, any user can open the message task and change its care center to redirect the message to a different care center.

Messages for Patients With No Care Center: If a patient does not have a care center assigned, message tasks for that patient will be visible to all locations on the Messaging queue.


You can open any message and assign it to a care center to make sure the correct office addresses the issue.

Display a Care Center’s Address on Form Letters, Reports, and in the Patient Portal

You can add care center variables during form configuration to produce form letters that contain the care center location.

You can also configure the care center address to appear on the Health Information Summary report and in the patient portal. To learn how, read the related section below.

Filter Reports by Care Center

Reports in the Report Library can be filtered by location, when applicable. And several reports, such as vaccine recall reports and the Broadcast Messaging Patient List report can exclude or include by care center. Keep in mind that care centers can have more than one location.

Location Comparison Caution: Appointment time increments between care center locations do not always match. Cross-location comparison may not be appropriate for care centers when standard appointment times are shorter at one location as compared to another.

The Practice Vitals Dashboard allows you to switch between care centers to see immunization rates and other details related to your financial and clinical pulse.

Care Center-Specific Provider Vaccine Rates: If your office is assigned to a care center, the detailed breakdown of immunization rates in the Practice. Vitals Dashboard will include only the providers who are assigned to the care center that you are viewing.

Configure and Manage Care Center Settings


If you are curious about care centers, please contact PCC Support to discuss your situation and decide if the care center features are right for your practice.

Once the Care Center features are enabled at your practice, read the sections below to learn how to configure patients, staff, and protocols for your practice’s care center locations.

Configure Your Location Flags and Practice Locations

After PCC Support turns on the Care Center features at your practice, you should double-check your location configuration. PCC can intelligently assign care centers based on the flags you are already using, or you can create new flags and locations and assign them to specific users.

First, each care center should have a location flag in the Patient Flags table in the Tables tool. You may already have this configured at your practice. If not, clone or create new flags.

Each care center should have a scheduling location. Contact PCC Support for help updating your places of service. They can add your care center location flag to the correct place of service, ensure that your scheduling locations are available as login locations, and configure whether or not the location should be a subpart of a main office for claims. After these changes, all patients with the flag will be automatically assigned to the associated care center.

Assign Login Locations to Care Centers

When you schedule appointments using care centers, PCC scheduling tools need to know which locations belong to each care center.

This is done by a PCC administrator, using login locations. Talk to PCC Support about mapping your login locations to the correct care center.

Train Your Staff to Assign Care Centers for Every Patient

During patient check-in, or whenever you create a new patient record, your practice should assign a care center for every patient.

Patients are assigned to the care center where they have office visits. This tends to be static, but there are situations where a patient might transfer care centers, similar to if they transferred to a new practice.

Your staff can select a care center on the Demographics section of PCC EHR, and anywhere the Patient Demographics component appears.

Once the patient is assigned to a care center, incoming phone and portal messages are assigned to care centers, defaulting to the patient’s care center. Links sent in portal notifications for sign-in, pre-check-in, portal messages, documents, and CHADIS questionnaires will bring the portal user to the patient’s assigned care center’s URL.

One Care Center Only: Patients can only have one care center assigned. If you add a new care center to a patient, PCC will automatically remove the old care center (and flag) for them.

Assign Members of Your Staff to Care Centers

An office manager or other administrative user at each care center location should review and set the care center for applicable staff members.

Many features in PCC EHR, including order assignment, provider lists, the Appointment Book and Patient Portal Administration will display according to the staff member’s assigned care center.

You can use the User Administration tool to add or edit a user’s care center.


What Happens When You Assign Your Staff to Care Centers?

How do you know who should be assigned to a care center and who should see what information for other care centers? Here’s how assigning a staff member to a care center will affect different workflows at your practice:

User Lists: The Care Center field in User Administration controls what names display in various user lists and drop-down menus in PCC EHR and pocketPCC. Staff are typically assigned to a care center so that user lists display only the other staff assigned to the same care center and floating staff who are not assigned to a care center.

Portal URL: Staff members who are assigned to a care center will see the URL for their assigned care center at the bottom of the Patient Portal Administration tool.

Scheduling in Appointment Book: Staff are typically assigned to a care center in order to see only the locations and providers that are linked to the same care center. Clinicians who are assigned to a care center are only able to be scheduled for appointments within their assigned care centers.

Setting Provider Hours: When setting up providers hours, only the locations mapped to a provider’s assigned care center will be available for selection.

Floating Staff Members: If a user floats between multiple locations, you can leave their care center blank. A user with no care center assigned will see — and be visible to — all other users, regardless of the other users’ care center.

Have You Linked Clinicians to Billing Providers?: Some PCC features, including Care Center features, rely on having PCC EHR users linked to the underlying billing providers used on claims. You can see whether or not your clinicians are linked up in the Provider column in the User Administration tool.


If you believe a provider is not correctly assigned, open the Providers table the Tables tool and enter the appropriate PCC EHR user.

Configure User Selection Lists

In the User Administration tool, you can customize the drop-down user lists for your care center. You can sort users in three ways: by first name, by last name, or in a manually arranged order.

Chat Visibility: Users from your Care Center will always appear at the top of the user list in the Chat feature, though the user list in Chat includes all active PCC EHR users. To find out more details about how to customize the order in which users appear, read Configure User Selection Lists.

Change Your Form Letters to Display a Care Center’s Address

When you generate a school excuse letter or other form letter, should it display your practice’s default address, or the patient’s care center address?

Review your practice’s common form letters and, when appropriate, add variables for the care center’s contact information to your form letters.

Configure the Address for the Health Information Summary and the Patient Portal

Use the Practice Preferences tool to set which location address appears on the Health Information Summary report and in the patient portal.



The Health Information Summary report and the patient portal will automatically display the patient’s care center address when you choose the “Display care center name…” option. If the patient has no care center assigned, they will see the practice’s default address.

If a portal user is associated with several patients who visit different care centers, multiple addresses will display in the portal when the portal user logs in.

Set Default Telemedicine Links for Each Care Center

Your practice can establish distinct telemedicine URLs for each care center in the Practice Preferences tool.

You can learn more about telemedicine configuration at Configure PCC EHR for Telemedicine Encounters.

Configure Portal Self Scheduling by Care Center

Each of your care centers can decide independently if they want to make portal scheduling available to their patients.

Click the “Edit” button under “Care Centers Offering Portal Scheduling” in the Scheduling Configuration tool. Then select the care centers that allow scheduling through the patient portal.

Only patients assigned to the selected centers can be scheduled through the patient portal. Patients assigned to care centers not offering portal scheduling will see the note “Please Call to Schedule” when they attempt to schedule through the portal.

Set Location Filters and Save Your Defaults

On the Messaging queue, your staff can set their location. If they are responsible for handling tasks for patients from several care center locations, they can select more than one.

After setting their location, your staff can click “Save My Defaults” and PCC EHR will remember their preferences the next time they log in.

Any Messaging queue items that do not have an assigned care center will appear for all users, regardless of their Location filter.

Move the Care Center Component in Messaging Protocols

After PCC Support turns on the Care Center features at your practice, all message protocols, such as phone notes and portal messages, will include the Care Center component at the top.

New messages are automatically assigned the care center of the patient, but users can change that care center to redirect a message to a different location.

You can use the Protocol Configuration Tool to move the component anywhere in the ribbon.


Clean Up Unassigned Messages

After turning on the Care Center features at your practice, you may need to spend some time answering and completing old message tasks that do not have an assigned care center. All new messages can have a care center, but your practice may have a backlog of message tasks to work through.

Any message without an assigned care center will appear for every location, regardless of the staff member’s location filter setting.

  • Last modified: September 24, 2026