Introduction
Organisational fields are custom data fields that appear on every patient profile within your organisation (e.g., DNACPR status, frailty score, mobility assessment). As an administrator, you can change the type of these fields (from Text to Number, Boolean, or Date Time) provided no patient data has been entered yet.
Before You Start
- Required permission: You must be an Organisation Administrator
- Critical constraint: You can only change a field's type if no patient values have been entered for that field. Once patient data exists, the field type is locked to preserve data integrity.
Steps
Accessing the Field Editor
- From the sidebar, select My Organization
- You can access this feature from any tab (Patients, Actions, Members, or Log)
- Click the kebab menu (⋮) in the top navigation bar
- Select Edit Organization Patient Fields
- The "Edit Organization Fields [Your Organisation Name]" dialog appears
Changing a Field Type
- Locate the field you want to modify in the draggable list
- Each field shows its current type in a dropdown (e.g., "Text", "Number", "Date Time", "Boolean")
- Click the type dropdown for that field
- Select the new type from the options:
- Text - for free-text entries (names, descriptions)
- Number - for numeric values (scores, counts)
- Date Time - for dates and times
- Boolean - for yes/no or true/false values
- The field is automatically marked as edited, and the save (✓) and cancel (✗) buttons become enabled
- Click the green checkmark button (✓) to save your change
- If successful: the field list refreshes and the new type is applied
- If you see a validation error: patient data already exists for this field, and the type cannot be changed
If You See a Validation Error
If you receive the error "A patient value has already been entered for this organization field and so it cannot be edited", this means:
- At least one patient has a value recorded for this field
- The field type is now locked to prevent data corruption
- You cannot change from Text to Number (for example) if text values already exist
Workaround: Create a new field with the desired type, migrate data manually if needed, then hide the old field using the "Visible"/"Hidden" toggle.
Tips
- Only one field at a time: You can only edit one field's type at a time. Save or cancel before editing another.
- Test on new fields first: If you're unsure about the field type, create it and test it before patients start using it.
- Hidden vs deleted: Use the "Visible"/"Hidden" toggle to remove fields from patient profiles without permanently deleting them. The field data is preserved but hidden from view.
- Reordering fields: Use the drag handle (⋮⋮) to reorder how fields appear on patient profiles. This saves automatically.
- Maximum field name length: Field names are limited to 255 characters.