Documents & media

Browse a patient’s documents

The Media tab on the patient chart is Hero EMR’s document home: scanned records, clinical photos, signed forms, and imported faxes all live here, as single files or multi-page grouped documents. The header reads Patient Media with a live document count, a Refresh button, and the primary Upload Media button. Documents are grouped by type, including:

1. Open the tab. In the chart tab bar, Media sits between Procedures and Letters. A chart with no documents shows No media files found for this patient with an Upload First File button.
2. Filter with the chips. Two chips sit above the list: All and Paperwork. Paperwork narrows the list to signed previsit forms only (see Signed forms & patient visibility). The Time | Type switch shows the dated table (Time, the default: all documents, newest first) or the documents grouped by type (Type); this browser remembers your choice.
3. Read the table. Columns are Document Name, Type, Date, Pages, and Actions, with a color-coded icon per document type (green for a Lab Report, blue for an Imaging Report, and so on). The Date column shows the clinical document date when one was captured, otherwise the upload date. Grouped multi-page documents and single-file uploads share one list — the Pages column tells them apart. When everything has loaded, the list ends with All documents loaded.
4. Open a document. Single-click selects a row; double-click it — or click View — to open the document viewer.
5. Use the row’s menu for everything else. Each row shows View and a … button (More actions) that opens the same menu as right-clicking the row: rename the document, Extract to chart, Undo import and Remove kept results (see Undo an import), Scan as insurance card (photos and PDFs, for people allowed to scan cards), and remove it (which asks first). A spinner beside the row shows an extraction or card scan that is still running.

Remove a document filed by mistake

Physicians and staff with document-import permission can use the row’s Remove document action or right-click and choose Remove document. Confirm in Remove document?. Removal closes the pending import review, but notes, diagnoses, and results already imported stay in the chart. To take them out too, choose Undo import from the document’s menu first (see Undo an import). If the file was attached to the wrong patient, those records need a separate correction.

Upload files to the chart

Open Upload Media and choose the purpose of the upload:

Upload Media is offered to every practice member who may add documents; billing staff, who have read-only charts, don’t see it. On a minor’s chart the dialog adds a Hide from parents and guardians switch, with a line saying what parents and guardians will see, and a File only upload also offers a Visit to tie the file to. The switch starts on when the chosen visit is hidden from parents. When your practice has ECG and imaging uploads turned on, the media types include ECG / Imaging (DICOM) (ECG & imaging files).

Add files with the picker or drag them into the dialog’s drop zone. Each file can be up to 50 MB. Extraction supports PDFs, supported images, and text; the dialog identifies unsupported types or large images that need compression. Multiple-file grouping has its own file checks. Review any Failed files before leaving.

Single-file extraction and imported-note jobs keep reading in the background after the dialog closes. You can continue other work and return to Imports for review.

Review extracted records before filing them

The Imports workspace keeps document processing and review in one queue: In progress, Needs review, Done, and Failed. Open it from the toolbar or the patient’s Imports strip. You can leave while a job reads; closing the workspace does not cancel background processing.

1. Verify the patient. Compare the document’s name and date of birth with the selected chart. A mismatch requires an explicit patient confirmation before records can be imported. Do not confirm a different patient just to bypass the warning.
2. For a minor, check the privacy card. A minor’s document gets a privacy card with a Visit choice (visits near the document’s date; ones hidden from parents are tagged Hidden from parents) and the Hide from parents and guardians switch. It starts on, and says why, when the chosen visit, a visit that day, or the document’s own date is hidden from parents, or when some pages couldn’t be read (On because some pages couldn’t be read, so the document’s date isn’t known.). If Hero can’t check the visits, the file stays hidden unless you turn it off. Importing waits until the check has loaded. See Hidden visits & items.
3. Compare extracted records with the source. Review labs, medications, diagnoses, and other records. The Source check identifies lab rows that disagree with the printed source, scan-only checks, and unchecked pages. Use the page links and acknowledge the comparison when required. Check values, units, ranges, dates, and panel grouping.
4. Code uncoded diagnoses when appropriate. A diagnosis marked No ICD-10 code in the document offers Choose code. Select the correct code from search; Change revises your choice. A diagnosis still needing a code is not ready to be filed as a coded problem.
5. Choose the records to file. The main button names the number of selected records, such as Import 3 records. Save file only keeps the source without adding its extracted records; Skip for now leaves review for later.

Use J/K to move through the queue and Ctrl/Cmd+Enter to import when the review requirements are met. Filed records appear in their chart categories; the source document remains in Media.

Extract from a document already in Media

Use Extract to chart on a supported document to start its reviewed import without uploading a second copy. The action is available on the row and its right-click menu for users allowed to import documents. Extraction still waits for review before filing records.

Undo an import: take a document’s records back out of the chart

If what a document added to the chart should not be there, undo its import. Undo takes out what that one document filed: notes, lab panels and their results, imaging studies, medications, problems, allergies, vitals and procedures. The document itself stays in the chart. Records from it still waiting for review are discarded. You can extract the document again afterwards.

1. Choose Undo import. In the chart’s Media tab, open the document’s … menu (or right-click the row). In Imports, open the import under Done and click Undo import.
2. Read what it removes. Undo import? checks the chart first and says what goes, for example “This removes 1 note and 31 lab results that came from this document. The document stays in the chart.” Anything it keeps is listed under Kept because they were changed or are in use, with the reason (for example 1 medication · prescribed, renewed or refilled).
3. Decide about results you already reviewed. Lab panels and imaging studies someone already reviewed stay by default. To take them out too, tick the box below the list, for example Also remove the 7 lab panels you already reviewed. (“The document stays in the chart, so you can still read them there.”). The box is unticked each time the dialog opens. Ticked, the summary is checked again and shows what goes with them.
4. Click Undo import, or Keep import to change nothing. Import undone confirms it, for example “Removed 1 note and 31 lab results from Maria’s chart. The document stays in Media.” Click Extract again in that message to read the document again; its records wait in Imports for your review.

What undo always keeps

Undo never removes a record someone has worked with. Each kept record is listed with one of these reasons:

Remove results an earlier undo kept

If you undid an import without the box, you can still remove the reviewed results it kept. In Media, the document’s … menu offers Remove kept results. In Imports filtered to one patient, Undone imports kept results you reviewed lists each such document with how many results it kept, and a Remove kept results link.

Remove kept results? reads, for example, “This import was already undone. It kept 7 lab panels because they were already reviewed. Remove them now?” Click Remove results, or Keep them. Hero checks again first: anything changed or in use since then stays. If nothing is left to remove, the dialog says “Nothing to remove: what this document kept was changed or is in use now, so it stays in the chart and won’t be offered again.” Click OK.

The document’s Results entry

A document’s Outside result entry in Inbox → Results goes with its results when nobody acted on it. An entry someone marked done, replied to, flagged or forwarded stays as history. Once its results are taken out of the chart, it reads “Its results were taken out of the chart when the import was undone. The document is still in the chart.” and no longer says values were added.

Group multi-page uploads into documents

Select two or more files in Extract data mode and Hero EMR runs the batch flow: the AI scans every page, classifies it, and proposes how the pages assemble into documents — a five-page hospital packet becomes one five-page document instead of five loose files. Inbound faxes imported from the Inbox arrive in the Media tab the same grouped way (see importing faxes).

1. Let the scan run. The modal steps through Uploading Files and Scanning Documents while the AI classifies pages.
2. Answer the grouping question. A Grouping Decision step may ask Are all pages part of one encounter packet? Choose Yes, one encounter packet (“Import as one continuity document anchored to the first informative page.”) or No, multiple studies/documents to continue to manual review and split or merge groups yourself.
3. Review the document groups. Review Document Groups shows the AI-suggested groups; any classification warnings appear in a yellow banner at the top. Per group you can rename it (pencil icon, Edit name), change the document type, Split a multi-page group into separate documents, or remove the whole group (Remove group). Within a group, reorder pages with Move up / Move down or pull one out with Remove from group; clicking a page shows it in the right-hand Preview panel.
4. Confirm. Confirm & Upload creates the documents — the modal shows Creating Documents then Upload Complete (“N documents have been added to the patient’s chart. Data extraction has started.”). The grouped documents appear in the Media list with their page counts.

View documents and edit their details

Double-clicking a row (or clicking the eye View icon) opens the shared document viewer — a large dialog whose header shows the document name with its type and page count (for example “Lab Report • 3 pages”). Multi-page documents get a thumbnail sidebar on the left for jumping between pages. PDFs and images render in-line; files that cannot be previewed offer a download instead. File kinds are shown in readable terms such as PDF or image.

1. Navigate the pages. Use the previous/next arrows with the Page X of N counter. PDFs get an extra inner control — PDF X/N — that steps through pages inside the PDF file itself.
2. Zoom, rotate, pan. Rotate (R), zoom in/out buttons, and a zoom dropdown from Fit up to 200%. Zoomed past Fit, drag the page to pan (a Drag to pan hint appears on hover).
3. Go fullscreen for reading. The expand button opens a black fullscreen mode with the same controls plus a thumbnail strip along the bottom; Exit Fullscreen (Esc) returns to the dialog.
4. Edit a grouped document’s details. For grouped documents, the pencil button (Edit metadata) opens an edit panel to change the document name, Document Type (a dropdown with Select type... and the available types), Document Date, Author, and Facility. Save commits, Cancel backs out, and the saved date, author, and facility show in a footer strip below the page.

Signed forms, agreements & what patients can see

E-signed paperwork files itself. When a patient signs assigned previsit paperwork, the PDF lands in Media automatically — no scanning, no uploading — and the Paperwork filter chip surfaces exactly those forms.

Documents flow the other way too: patients can upload files from the portal’s media area (and the patient mobile app’s camera scanner), and those uploads appear in the chart Media tab alongside staff uploads — so check the upload date and document name when triaging. Inbound faxes can be linked to a patient and imported from the Inbox, creating a grouped document here (see importing faxes). To fax a chart document to an outside provider, use Fax on their Care team card and select the document (see Faxing a provider).

File ECGs and imaging studies (DICOM) in the chart

Hero can take the files an ECG machine or an imaging CD produces (DICOM files), file them on the chart, and show them in the document viewer: ECG tracings you can measure, and images you can scroll and adjust. It is off until your practice turns it on.

Turn it on

1. Open Admin → ECG / DICOM devices (practice administrators, the owner and office managers who may manage practice settings). Device settings in the ECG inbox opens the same window; anyone else sees the practice settings read-only: A practice administrator can change these settings.
2. Choose the practice settings: Enable ECG and imaging uploads, Enable the ECG device inbox, Automatically file exact chart-number matches, and Send patient details to the ECG device (GDT), which needs the device’s short names, test code, character set and GDT version (confirm these with the device supplier). Press Save practice settings.
3. Connect the ECG computer, in one of two ways. Either way, the device files stay in the folder.
   • With Hero Connect (no browser needed): on the computer the ECG machine exports to, install Hero Connect, then add the folder on that computer’s card in Admin → Office devices as a Folder of exported files (ECG, other machines) device (see Add a folder of exported files). Hero Connect sends each new export to the ECG inbox with nothing left open.
   • In Chrome: on the computer the ECG machine exports to, open Hero in Google Chrome, open the same window, give it a Workstation label and click Connect export folder to choose the folder the device writes to. Keep Hero open on that computer to receive exports. Send to ECG (below) works only through this Chrome connection.

Upload a study to a chart

In the chart’s Media tab, Upload Media → ECG / Imaging (DICOM) opens Upload ECG / Imaging. Choose files or Choose folder from the device or the patient’s CD (each file up to 250 MB). Hero lists each study it found — description, type, the patient named in the files, date, series and files — under the chart’s own name, birth date and chart number. If the patient in the files differs from the chart, you must tick the confirmation before uploading; if some images are already filed, it says where. Then click Upload. Physicians and staff allowed to import documents can upload.

The ECG inbox

• With the device inbox on, an ECG inbox button on the toolbar shows how many exports wait to be filed. Each one shows the patient named in the file, birth date, chart number, study date and the ECG computer, with Matched by chart number, Possible match by name and date of birth or No match.
• File in chart opens File ECG in patient chart: check or Change patient, optionally Link to the suggested visit on the study date, then File ECG. Always confirm the patient before filing.
• Dismiss removes an export from the inbox (The original file stays on the ECG computer.). Load older ECGs shows more.

Send the patient to the ECG machine

With GDT on, the chart header offers Send to ECG on the ECG computer (in Chrome): the patient’s details go to the device’s folder, and Hero confirms {name}’s details are ready for the ECG device. Confirm the patient on the device before recording. If another patient is still waiting there, choose Replace pending request.

Viewing

An ECG opens as a tracing with Speed (12.5, 25 or 50 mm/s) and Gain (5, 10 or 20 mm/mV); click two points on one tracing to measure time, and Clear measurement to start again. An imaging study offers Window / level, Zoom, Pan, Length, Angle, a contrast preset and Reset; the arrow keys scroll through the images. Download original gives the file itself. Hero prepares a printable copy of each ECG for printing or faxing (Preparing printable copy…). Older files in long-term storage show Retrieve archived files; refresh the study a few minutes later.