Refill Center

Refill Center: one list of medicines running out

The Refill Center lists the patients whose medicines run out soon, split into controlled and non-controlled. You review the chart beside the list and refill from a dialog that is already filled in from the last prescription, for one patient or for several patients in one pass. Hero writes a draft refill note and a portal message for you to check. Medical assistants and nurses can pend refills for a physician, controlled refills wait in a queue and go to your phone together for signing, and nurses you authorize can send non-controlled refills under your written protocol.

1. Check the feature is on. Refill Center is on for every practice by default. A practice administrator can switch it off, or back on, in Admin → Additional Features and click Save Changes.
2. Give staff access. The Medical Assistant and Nurse role profiles already include both Refill Center permissions (below). Other staff need them added in their role profile or under Customize granular permissions.
3. Check the settings. Open the Refill Center and click the gear (Refill Center settings) to set the worklist window, the refill note and message, and nurse protocol refills (see Settings).

Who can do what

Each column and panel follows the person’s own chart permissions: what they may not read shows a lock and No access. Someone without Refill Center access who opens the page sees “You don’t have access to the Refill Center”, with the permission to ask a practice admin for.

Open the Refill Center and pick a list

Click Refill Center (pill icon) in the top bar; it opens in its own tab. The button shows only when the feature is on and you can open the page.

Filter Due soon

• Segment: Non-controlled, Controlled or All. A physician with a DEA registration starts on Controlled, everyone else on Non-controlled; Hero then remembers your choice.
• Running out within 7, 14, 30 or 60 days (the practice setting, 14 days, to start), and Ran out in the last none, 7, 14, 30, 60, 90 or 120 days (30 to start).
• Prescriber: Me (where physicians start), All physicians (where staff start), or one physician.
• Sources: Running out, Patient asked and Pharmacy asked; at least one stays ticked.
• Hide snoozed (on), and a search box for Name or MRN.

Above the list, Columns chooses and orders the worklist columns (saved for you, for each segment), physicians get My defaults (the note and message Hero starts from when you refill; see The refill note and message), and practice administrators get the gear for Settings.

Read the worklist and act on a patient

Due soon has one row per patient. Clicking the patient’s name opens the chart; clicking anywhere else on the row opens the review panel. The patient column stays in place while you scroll the columns sideways.

• Medications due lists each medicine with its own checkbox and a schedule chip (C-II in red, and so on), when it runs out (runs out Oct 24 (7 days), runs out today, ran out 3 days ago or Run-out date unknown), the last fill, the refills left and the prescriber. A request for a medicine that is not on the medication list is shown without a checkbox, marked not on the medication list; prescribe it from the chart.
• Status chips: Pended, Queued to sign, Signing on phone, Snoozed (hover for the date), Sent today, Needs attention, Sign-off due, Sign-off overdue, Patient request, Pharmacy request, and Early when more than 7 days of supply are left.
• Columns shown to start: Prescriber, Last visit, Next appointment, Allergies, Linked problems, Alerts, PDMP (Controlled only), My last note, Colleague’s last note and Status. Columns adds others, such as the controlled-substance agreement, the last urine drug screen, a lab value (lithium, TSH, A1c or creatinine), a PHQ-9 or GAD-7 score, the last BP, insurance, phone, portal account and no-shows. Last visit turns red when it is older than the nurse protocol visit window.
• Order: the soonest run-out first (a request counts as due today). Pended lists the oldest first, Done today the newest first, and Sign-off overdue first. Fifty patients load at a time; Show more patients loads the next.

Select and act

1. Tick the medicines. Tick a medicine’s own box, a patient’s box (every medicine of theirs you can act on), or the box at the top of the list (every patient listed, as far as the limits allow). Ticks stay as you work down the list, across as many patients as you need; a patient’s box shows a dash when only some of their medicines are ticked. A medicine that is already pended, queued or snoozed can’t be ticked; find it in its tab. Changing tab or segment clears the ticks, and a patient who drops off the list (after a search, for example) is unticked.
2. Choose the action. For one patient the bar reads, for example, 2 medications · Sample Patient, with Refill, Send per protocol, Pend, Message, Needs visit and Snooze; you see only the buttons your role allows. For several patients it reads, for example, 12 medications · 7 patients, and Review refills, Pend and Snooze act on all of them (see Refill several patients). Clear unticks everything.

The keyboard works on Due soon: ↑/↓ move between patients, x ticks or clears the patient you are on, Shift+A ticks everything listed (press it again to clear), r refills (Review refills when several patients are ticked), p pends, m messages and Esc closes the review panel. With nothing ticked, r, p and m act on every medicine of the patient you are on. The keys do nothing while you type or while a dialog is open.

Snooze a patient

Snooze hides the medicines from Due soon for a while. Choose For how long (7 days, 14 days, 30 days, or Until a date up to a year ahead) and Why (Managed by another clinician, Stopped or changed, Patient does not want a refill, or Other with a note). To bring one back early, untick Hide snoozed and click Unsnooze on the line. Pending a medicine also ends its snooze.

Review the chart beside the list

The review panel opens on the right for the patient you click. Its header says whether portal messages reach the patient (Portal messages reach them, or why not, such as No portal account), with Open chart.

If the patient’s medicines are restricted for you, the row says No access and “You can’t see this patient’s medications.”

Refill as a physician

1. Tick the medicines and click Refill (or press r). The Refill dialog has one row per medicine, filled in from the last prescription: Directions (sig), Quantity (unit), Days supply, Refills, Pharmacy, Generic substitution OK and Note to pharmacy, with the diagnoses it is for.
2. Check the pharmacy. A refill needs a pharmacy. It starts on the last prescription’s pharmacy; the picker searches the patient’s saved pharmacies and the directory. Choosing another pharmacy here doesn’t change the patient’s saved list.
3. Change what needs changing. Hero re-checks your edits a moment after you stop typing (Checking your changes…), so new warnings show before you send. You can’t change the medicine or strength here; prescribe a new one from the chart.
4. Read the warnings. For example “Changed from the last prescription: quantity.”, “This is early: the current supply lasts until …”, “An allergy was added since the last prescription.”, “The last visit is older than the visit window.” or, for a controlled medicine, “Controlled-substance checklist items are not met: … Confirm you reviewed them.” Sending acknowledges them.
5. Send. The button says what will happen: Sign & send for non-controlled medicines, Add to controlled queue for controlled ones, or Sign & send 1 · queue 1 for a mix. Non-controlled refills go to the pharmacy at once; controlled refills wait in your queue (see Controlled refills). A toast sums it up, for example “2 refills sent, 1 added to the controlled queue.”
6. Check the note and message. Finish the refill opens with the draft refill note and the patient message side by side (see The refill note and message).

When Hero won’t refill

The refill note and the patient message

With Write the refill note for me on (the default), each refill files a draft Medication Refill Note on a non-billable Medication Refill visit for the patient, one per physician per day. The built-in note says the chart was reviewed (medication list, allergies, active problems and the most recent visit), lists each medicine refilled with its directions, quantity, days, refills and pharmacy (sent or queued for signature), adds the PDMP sentence for a controlled refill (for example PDMP (KY) reviewed 10/17/2026 by Dr. Sample.), and ends with the next appointment.

1. Read both in Finish the refill. The note sits on the left and the Message to the patient on the right. Tick Sign the note and Send a portal message as needed; Edit the note in the chart opens the note instead. When the patient’s own request will already get the standard update, the message box starts unticked (“The patient will also get the standard refill update for their request.”).
2. Click the button. Sign note & send message, Sign note or Send message. Finish later leaves the note unsigned in Finish documentation.

Finish documentation lists what is left, with why: “The refill note is not signed yet.”, “The note changed after you approved it, so Hero did not sign it.”, “Not every prescription went out, so the note was not signed as approved.” or “Hero does not know whether the patient message went out.” Click Review & sign. When it is empty it reads “Nothing left to finish.”

Your defaults and quick messages

• My defaults (My refill defaults) chooses the Refill note and Message after a refill Hero starts from when you refill: Practice default, or one of your own dot phrases (add them in Settings → Dotphrase).
• Message opens Message the patient. Pick a message from Practice messages, My messages or Standard messages, edit the Subject and Text, and click Send message. The standard messages include Refill sent, Refill sent, visit needed before next refill, Please schedule a visit, Labs needed before refill, Refill not approved, please call and Controlled refill: agreement/UDS due. If Hero couldn’t fill something in, it says so; edit the text before sending.
• Needs visit opens Needs a visit, filled in with Please schedule a visit. Send & snooze 14 days sends it and snoozes the medicines for 14 days; they come back if no refill went out.

Messages go out as ordinary portal messages and never include the PDMP sentence. A patient without a portal account can’t get one: Hero says to call them instead, and Needs a visit offers Snooze 14 days while the office calls. There is no text or email fallback.

Refilled several patients at once? Finish all does the same for every one of them on one screen (see Refill several patients).

Refill several patients in one pass

Tick medicines for several patients on Due soon, then review, send and finish them together. Each patient is still checked, sent and documented on their own, so a problem with one patient never stops or undoes another’s. Refilling needs a physician, as for one patient; anyone who can pend or snooze can do that for several patients too.

1. Tick the patients and medicines. Ticks stay as you work down the list (see Select and act). The bar reads, for example, 12 medications · 7 patients.
2. Click Review refills (or press r). The Review refills window has one section per patient with the same rows as the one-patient Refill dialog, filled in from the last prescription: directions, quantity, days supply, refills, pharmacy, generic substitution and the note to pharmacy, with each row’s warnings listed under it. “Each patient is checked and sent on their own. Sending acknowledges the warnings shown for that patient.”
3. Check each patient. Change what needs changing (Hero re-checks your edits, as in the one-patient dialog) or untick a row to leave it out. A medicine that can’t be refilled from here is marked Left out with the reason, and a row Hero refuses shows why without its fields. Each patient’s heading says what will happen, for example 1 send now · 1 to your controlled queue, and controlled refills show your PDMP status for that patient.
4. Read the summary and send. The footer adds it up, for example 10 send now · 2 to your controlled queue · 1 can’t be refilled · 1 needs a fix. Click Sign & send all (Add all to controlled queue when every refill is controlled). The button waits while patients are still being prepared (Preparing 3 patients…) or your edits are being checked, and until every ticked row has what it needs, such as a pharmacy.
5. Watch each patient’s result. A list shows each patient: Sending…, then, for example, 2 refills sent · 1 added to your controlled queue, and the footer counts 3 of 7 patients done. Non-controlled refills go to the pharmacy at once; controlled ones wait in your controlled queue. The window stays open until every send has answered.
6. Finish all. When every patient’s refills went out, Finish all opens by itself with each patient’s refill note and portal message (below). If a patient failed, retry or review them first, or click Finish all for the patients that went out. Finish later leaves their notes under Finish documentation.

Finish all

Finish all lists every patient with the first line of the refill note and the message subject. Click a name to read the whole Medication Refill Note and edit the Message to the patient.

• Each patient has Sign note and Send message, ticked the way Finish the refill starts them from your practice settings. When a portal message can’t reach the patient, the row says so, for example No portal account: message skipped; call them if needed.
• One button does it all and says what it will do, for example Sign 7 notes & send 6 messages. Each message you send needs a subject and text: “Add a subject and text to each message you send, or turn that message off.”
• Controlled refills are marked Controlled queue and offer Approve note and Approve message instead: “For refills in your controlled queue, you approve the note and message now. Hero signs and sends them after you sign the prescriptions on your phone.” The message can only be approved with its note.
• Edit in the chart opens one patient’s note to edit; the others wait under Finish documentation. Finish later leaves them all there.

When it is done Hero says, for example, Finished 7 patients., and adds when a message may not have gone out, so you check those threads before sending again. A patient that could not be finished is listed with Not finished: and the reason, and the button becomes Retry 1 patient.

Pend or snooze for several patients

Message, Needs visit and Send per protocol work one patient at a time: with several patients ticked they are greyed out (One patient at a time).

Limits and what can go wrong

Pend a refill for a physician

Medical assistants and nurses (and physicians, for a colleague) prepare the refill and pend it; nothing is sent until a physician approves it.

1. Tick the medicines and click Pend (or press p). Pend for a physician has the same rows as a refill, plus Physician to sign (the original prescriber first, chosen for you) and Note for the physician, for example patient called, runs out tomorrow.
2. Click Pend for and the physician’s name. You can pend without a pharmacy (“No pharmacy is chosen yet. The physician picks one when approving.”). No prescription is created.
3. Follow it in Pended. Staff see Pended by me. Withdraw takes a pend back. When a physician declines one, it shows Declined by the physician with their reason, and counts on your badge until you click Got it.

For the physician

Physicians see For me (where they start) or All pended, with who pended it, for whom, and the note. Any active physician can act on any pended refill.

• Review & approve opens Approve pended refill with the note shown at the top. Change anything, then Approve & send: a non-controlled refill goes to the pharmacy, a controlled one joins your controlled queue.
• Decline asks for a Reason, which the person who pended it sees (“Declined. The person who pended it will see why.”).

Queue controlled refills and sign them on your phone

Controlled refills don’t go out one by one. Add to controlled queue keeps an unsigned draft in your queue, so you can work through the list and sign them together at the end. This needs your DEA registration and EPCS signing set up; otherwise the rows say “Controlled refills need phone signing (EPCS) set up for you.”

1. Approve the documentation as you go. After you queue a refill, Finish the refill offers Approve note & message (or Approve note): “Hero signs the note and sends the message after you sign the prescriptions on your phone.” If something changes on the way, they wait under Finish documentation instead. The message is approved together with the note (“The message is approved together with the note.”): untick Approve the note and no message goes out either, so the patient never hears a refill was sent before you signed it. After a multi-patient refill, Finish all approves them for every patient at once.
2. Open the queue. The Controlled queue bar at the bottom of the page counts the prescriptions and patients. Open it to see them by patient, each marked Note approved, Note not approved yet or Note changed, approve again. Remove deletes an unsigned draft; nothing has been sent. While a note is not approved, the queue says “Approve the refill note for each patient first.” with Open Finish documentation; you can still send, and that patient’s note then waits under Finish documentation after you sign.
3. Click Send to phone to sign. One notification goes to your phone for the whole queue (up to 50 prescriptions): “Sent to your phone. Open Hero there to sign.”
4. Sign on your phone. Open Hero on the phone you use for EPCS and sign with your passkey: “Open Hero on your phone. Tick each prescription, then sign each patient’s with Face ID.” One signature covers one patient’s ticked prescriptions, never two patients’, so a queue for several patients takes one signature per patient. Older versions of the Hero app approve each prescription in turn. The signing request ends after 15 minutes.
5. Watch them go out. Each prescription reads Waiting for your phone, Signed, Sending… and Sent. When all are done the bar says Phone signing finished.; Clear progress tidies it up.

Nurse protocol refills and sign-off

A practice with a written refill protocol can let registered nurses send non-controlled refills themselves, under the original prescriber’s name. The prescriber then signs each one off within the days you set. It is off until a practice administrator turns it on, and it needs each nurse authorized by name; no role permission grants it.

1. Turn it on. In Settings → Nurse protocol refills, switch on Let authorized nurses send non-controlled refills under our protocol. Hero asks you to confirm that “Our physicians approved a written refill protocol that covers these refills, and every nurse we authorize works under it.” Your name and the time are recorded. Set the protocol limits (below).
2. Authorize each nurse. Under Authorized nurses, choose the Nurse, enter the RN license no. and State, tick “I checked this RN license with the state board of nursing.” and click Add. Only registered nurses added here can send per protocol; medical assistants and LPNs can pend. The nurse also needs the Refill Center open permission.
3. The nurse sends. The nurse ticks the medicines and clicks Send per protocol. The dialog checks every protocol rule: protocol refills on, nurse authorized, not controlled, not a compound, the same drug, strength, form and directions as last time, days supply and refills within the limits, seen recently enough, the prescriber active and set up for e-prescribing, the medicine current, no allergy added since the last prescription, and no open pharmacy renewal. A medicine that fails any rule is blocked, and Pend instead pends it for a physician. Send for and the prescriber’s name sends the rest.
4. The prescriber signs off. The refill appears in the prescriber’s Sign-off tab, due a set number of days after it was sent (Overdue in red once late). Details shows the protocol checklist and the draft refill note. Sign off, or tick several and Sign off selected; signing off signs the refill note as the prescriber’s and records that they reviewed the prescription. Only the prescriber of record can sign it off.

When the patient asked for the refill in the portal, the nurse’s send claims their request first, so two people can’t answer it at once (“… is prescribing this refill request. Nothing was sent.”), and the patient gets the standard update.

Refill Center settings

The gear on the page opens Refill Center settings, “For everyone in the practice.” Practice administrators, and staff allowed to manage additional features, can change them. Click Save; every change is recorded.

Patient and pharmacy requests, and the Inbox

The Refill Center reads the same requests as the Inbox; it doesn’t move them. With Include open refill requests on, they show on Due soon even when the supply isn’t running out.

If something goes wrong