Hi everyone,
I’m excited to share a new feature I’ve been developing that I think many of you will find useful, especially those working across different care settings or managing diverse patient populations.
The Problem I’m Solving
We’ve all been there - the patient dashboard shows everything at once, but depending on your role or the type of visit, you really only need to see specific information. An emergency visit needs vitals and allergies front and center. A routine primary care visit benefits from the full picture. Behavioral health focuses on different elements than pediatrics.
Currently, everyone sees the same dashboard regardless of context. That’s a lot of scrolling and visual clutter when you’re trying to focus on what matters for this patient, this visit.
What Dashboard Context Manager Does
This module lets you switch between predefined “care contexts” that show only the widgets relevant to your current workflow.
Built-in Contexts
We’ve included nine starting contexts based on common clinical scenarios:
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Primary Care - comprehensive view with all widgets
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Emergency - streamlined to critical info: demographics, allergies, problems, meds, vitals, insurance
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Outpatient - balanced view for routine visits
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Inpatient - focused on active care needs
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Telehealth - essentials plus portal status
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Behavioral Health - emphasizes notes and care team
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Pediatric - includes immunizations and reminders
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Geriatric - adds care preferences and treatment goals
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Specialty - configured for referral-based care
Customize Your Own
Don’t see exactly what you need? Create custom contexts with your preferred widget combination.
Set for Primary Care
I still have a couple widget yet to be configured for this feature but you get the concept I hope.
For Administrators
Admins can assign default contexts by user role, lock contexts when standardization matters, and manage settings across facilities.
I Need Your Input
This is the first time I’ve created a topic on Day to Day and many of you may know me and my work as both an Admin and developer, however, this is a feature that Robert Down(his idea) and I discussed several year ago but never had time to develop and provide for you folks.
I think it’s important enough to take time from ONC work to get it public. This is where you come in. I’ve built what I think covers common workflows, but you’re the ones using OpenEMR daily with real patients in real clinics.
I’d love to hear:
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What contexts would help your practice? Are there care settings we haven’t considered?
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Which widgets matter most for your specialty? The default configurations are our best guesses - what would you change?
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How do you envision using this? Individual preference? Practice-wide standards? Both?
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What’s missing? Features that would make this more useful for your workflow?
Whether you’re running a small rural clinic, a community health center, or supporting underserved populations with limited resources, your perspective helps us build something that actually works for the people who need it most.
This is open source, built by and for our community. Your feedback directly shapes what this becomes.
Drop your thoughts below or reach out directly. Screenshots, workflow descriptions, even rough ideas - all welcome.
A Personal Note
I also want to take a moment to recognize the incredible team behind OpenEMR. Our current group of Admins, Engineers/Developers and a new professional engineering team contributing to the OpenEMR project represent some of the most dedicated people I’ve had the privilege to work alongside.
These folks aren’t just talented engineers - they’re genuinely good people (I’d love to name these folks but fear I may embarrass someone as they don’t seek recognition) who’ve donated years of expertise to ensure OpenEMR remains a viable, modern solution for healthcare organizations of all sizes. They show up not having to, because they believe quality healthcare software shouldn’t be a luxury only well-funded institutions can afford.
Their commitment to our mission of supporting underserved communities keeps this project moving forward. Features like Dashboard Context Manager exist because of their willingness to invest serious professional effort into something they give away freely.
If you’re benefiting from OpenEMR in your practice, know that there’s a dedicated team working behind the scenes who truly care about making your work easier and your patients’ care better.
Thank you for being part of this community that I’m personally very proud of for the contribution to help each other resolve issues amongst yourselves. Look around and you’ll find this community is unique among opensource projects.
Lastly, please consider donating to help us get the ONC certification finished and released. I’m hoping to get this feature in our soon to be released version 7.0.4 for new features and bug fixes. Then, with your support, we can release our major certification release.
Jerry
Feel free to download the features user guide: Dashboard_Context_Manager_User_Guide.md.pdf (264.9 KB)
