Services & Categories
How to define what your hospital offers and organize services into categories.
Services & Categories
Services are the building blocks of appointments — every booking is for a specific service. This page explains how to define what your hospital offers and organize services into categories.
Prerequisites
You need at least one centre and one department. You should also have your service types configured in Tenant Configuration. See: Setting Up Centres and Tenant Configuration.
What is a Service?
A service is something your hospital offers to patients: General Consultation, Blood Test, X-Ray, ECG, Physiotherapy Session, and so on. Each service has a type, a default duration, and various settings. Services must be mapped to centres and doctors before they can be booked.
Service Categories
Categories group related services. Examples: "Consultations", "Lab Tests", "Imaging", "Procedures", "Therapies". Categories can be nested (e.g., "Blood Tests" under "Lab Tests").
Setting Name | What It Does | Default | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
Category Name | Display name | (required) | "Consultations", "Lab Tests", "Imaging" |
Category Code | Unique identifier | (required) | "CONSULT", "LAB", "IMAGING" |
Parent Category | Nest under another category | None | "Blood Tests" under "Lab Tests" |
Display Order | Position in the list (lower = first) | 0 | 1 for Consultations, 2 for Lab Tests |
Creating a Service
To add a service, enter the basic information first: the service name ("General Consultation", "Complete Blood Count", "Chest X-Ray"), a unique service code ("GEN-CONSULT", "CBC", "XRAY-CHEST"), the service type (from your configured types), and the category it belongs to.
Then configure the service details. The default duration sets how long this service typically takes, in minutes. This can be overridden at the centre or doctor level. Set 15 for a quick consultation, 30 for a detailed checkup, or 5 for a simple blood draw.
Requires doctor indicates whether a doctor must be assigned for appointments with this service. For consultations, this is always yes. For lab tests where a technician collects samples, it may be no.
Requires referral controls whether a referral from another doctor is needed to book this service. Specialist consultations often require a general practitioner referral. When enabled, the patient or receptionist must provide a referral reference when booking.
Requires prior appointment means the patient must have an existing appointment before booking this service. This is common for follow-up lab tests ordered during a consultation — the patient cannot book the lab test independently.
Patient instructions are preparation notes shown to the patient before the appointment. For a fasting blood test: "Do not eat or drink anything except water for 12 hours before the test." These instructions appear in the booking confirmation.
Fasting required and fasting hours apply to lab services. When fasting is required, the system can show a fasting reminder to the patient. Set fasting hours to 8 for basic blood tests or 12 for a lipid profile.
Sample type applies to lab and diagnostic services. Record whether the service requires a Blood, Urine, Stool, or other sample. This helps lab staff prepare the right collection equipment.
Display order controls the position of this service in search results and listings. Lower numbers appear first. Use this to put your most commonly booked services at the top of the list.
Mapping Services to Centres
After creating a service, you map it to each centre where it is available. This mapping is where you fine-tune how the service works at each location. The same service can behave quite differently at different centres.
Custom duration and price let you override the service defaults for this centre. A general consultation might be 15 minutes at the main branch (high volume, quick appointments) and 20 minutes at a smaller branch (more relaxed pace). The price can differ too — Rs 500 at the main branch, Rs 300 at a satellite clinic.
Operating hours for a service can override the centre's regular hours. Perhaps your lab services are only available from 7 AM to 11 AM (for fasting blood tests), even though the centre is open until 6 PM. Setting custom operating hours on the lab service mapping means lab slots are only generated in that morning window.
Slots per hour applies to services that do not require a doctor. A lab that can process 6 blood tests per hour would set this to 6. The system generates capacity accordingly.
Daily limit caps how many bookings per day this service can have at this centre. Set 50 for lab tests to manage equipment capacity, or leave empty for no limit.
Walk-in settings are configured per centre-service mapping. You can enable walk-ins, choose a walk-in slot reservation strategy (percentage or fixed count), and set how many slots to reserve. This means you can accept walk-ins for General Consultation but not for specialist services, all at the same centre.
Resources required links this service at this centre to specific resources. If a Cardiac Consultation at the Main Branch requires "ECG Machine" and "Consultation Room 1", listing those resources here helps with scheduling and capacity planning.
Overbooking can be enabled per centre-service mapping. Enable it for high-demand vaccination drives but keep it off for specialist consultations.
Service must be mapped to appear in search
Mapping Services to Doctors
Specify which doctors offer which services at which centres. A doctor can offer multiple services, and each mapping can have a custom duration and fee.
Required for Booking
Custom Service Types
What Happens Next?
Set the pricing for each service. See: Pricing Configuration.
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