If you've recorded a patient's pronouns in their details, you can take things a step further and use placeholders to automatically add pronouns to letters and confirmation emails and reminders.
You would most likely be adding these to letters where you'd be referring to the patient in third person, such as a referral letter to another clinician. In this guide, we'll be using letters as an example, but note that you can include pronouns in confirmation emails and reminders if you want. We'll go over a few key things:
General questions about the process (including what happens if you don't record a patient's pronouns, but use the placeholders).
Add pronouns to letter templates
The first thing you'll need to do is edit your letter templates (or create new templates). When you're in the template's settings, look for the PATIENT (or CLIENT) menu:
When you select that, you’ll notice that there’s a dedicated pronoun section:
This is where you’ll select the pronoun placeholders. Note that the template defaults to “them” pronouns, but what shows up in the patient’s letters will be dependent on what you’ve set up in their details.
When you select a pronoun placeholder, it will show up in boxes in the letter template. Below is an example:
Save or update the changes and now, it's onto the actual "writing the letter" bit!
Write a letter that includes a patient's pronouns
Once you've added the pronoun placeholders to your letter templates, you can write your letters. ✍️ In the example below, the patient has "she/her" pronouns recorded. You can see that the letter includes these pronouns, but you can also see that there's a disclaimer at the top, letting you know that the template contains pronoun placeholders and might require further editing in case something looks off:
Once you've confirmed that everything looks good, you can save the letter and send it off 🎉!
General questions about using pronoun placeholders
Am I required to use pronoun placeholders? Nope, not at all. They're simply available as an option!
Why would I want to use pronouns in my patient letters? This blog post on inclusivity offers some helpful tips about this!
What if I use the placeholders, but some of my patients don't have pronouns set? The placeholders will use a default "they/them" pronoun if no other pronouns are set in the patient's details. You can also edit the letter before sending it off, so even if you have placeholders set up, you can still modify how the final letter looks!
If you have further questions about using pronouns in letters, our support team is here to help. Just use the "chat" icon in the lower-right corner to get in touch with us!