When is Excel enough, and when is it not?
Excel is free, familiar and, for a small patient list kept by one person, enough for a long time. The problem is not the file itself but how many people change it, from how many devices and how often. If the signs below repeat in your clinic every week, the file is no longer carrying the work.
| Sign | What happens in Excel | What changes with software |
|---|---|---|
| Two appointments at the same time | Appointments sit on a separate sheet or in a diary; spotting a clash is left to a person. | A second appointment cannot be booked for the same room or chair at the same time. |
| The balance list does not match the till | A payment is typed into a column and the remainder is worked out by hand; one forgotten row grows into a difference. | The remaining balance updates with every payment; debtor patients sit in one list. |
| The question “who changed this?” | As the file is copied, the trail of a change is lost. | Every record is kept with who did what and when. |
| More than one copy of the file | Separate versions on the computer, the phone and in e-mail; nobody knows which is current. | There is one record; the web and mobile apps show the same data. |
| Everyone sees everything | Whoever opens the file sees balances, notes and phone numbers together. | Receptionist, doctor and manager work with separate permissions; quick notes are visible only to the person who wrote them. |
| Call lists made by hand | Who needs a call is found by going through the rows one by one. | Debtor patients and patients who have not visited for a while are gathered in separate lists; a WhatsApp message opens with one tap. |
The opposite is true as well: a single-doctor private practice with a few patients a day and one computer can get by with Excel for a while longer. The point of switching is not to pick up a new habit but to hand the checks you do by hand today over to the screen.
What are the risks while the patient list lives in Excel?
A patient list is not an ordinary address book. Data protection law, the GDPR in the EU and the UK and KVKK in Türkiye, treats health data as special-category personal data and expects the data controller to take technical and organisational measures against unlawful access. In an Excel file most of those measures are left to the care of whoever uses it:
- A file sent by e-mail or a messaging app leaves a copy on every device it reaches.
- A file on the desktop is open to anyone who turns on that computer; a file password is usually not set, or everyone knows it.
- Without a backup the list goes with a failed disk or a lost laptop; with a backup, where the backup lives becomes the next problem.
- There is no way to get back the copy left with an employee who has moved on.
Switching to software does not remove this responsibility; it ties access to a person and keeps a trail. Clinigim is developed and operated in Turkey; the database is kept in a data centre in Turkey, patient files and encrypted backups in data centres in the EU; connections are encrypted. Each clinic sees only its own data, free-text clinical notes are stored encrypted and two-step verification is available at sign-in. Details are on the security page; for the full picture of your obligations, talk to a data protection adviser.
How to prepare the Excel file before importing
Most import problems come from the file itself: merged cells, two rows for the same person, dates and phone numbers written in different formats in the same column. Before uploading, make a copy of the file, leave the original alone, and set the copy up like this: the first row holds the column headers, every row after it holds exactly one patient.
The table below shows the seven columns Clinigim recognises in a patient import. Headers may be in English or Turkish. A single “Full name” column is recognised too; the whole name goes into the first-name field.
| Column | What goes in it | Example |
|---|---|---|
| First Name | The only required field. If first and last name share one column, that column is accepted. | Emma |
| Last Name | As a separate column; may be left empty. | Reed |
| Phone | Read according to the clinic’s country; an unreadable number is left empty with a warning. | +44 7700 900123 |
| An address without an @ is left empty with a warning. | [email protected] | |
| Date of Birth | Day.month.year or year-month-day. Month/day/year is not accepted. | 12.05.1985 |
| Notes | Free text about the patient. | Imported from the old file |
| Address | Optional. | Town, county |
Only the headers of these seven columns; no sample data, and your e-mail address is not asked for. Open it in Excel and fill it in.
National ID number and gender columns are not imported; Clinigim’s patient record has no such fields, and the preview says it saw those columns and will not use them. Not carrying sensitive data you do not need into the new system is good practice anyway.
Old .xls files are not read; open the file in Excel and save it as an Excel Workbook (.xlsx). If you use CSV, the separator may be a semicolon or a comma; accented characters are read correctly.
Switching from Excel to software in 7 steps
The switch is done in a day; the part not to rush is the check at the end. The order:
- Make a copy of the file; always import from the copy.
- Clean the copy: delete empty rows and sub-headings, split merged cells, reduce repeated rows for the same person to one.
- Name the column headers after the table above; delete the columns you will not use.
- Upload a small trial file of ten rows first. If the result is wrong, undo the import and fix the file.
- Upload the full file. Check the column matching and, in the preview, every row flagged as a warning, an error or an existing patient, one by one.
- Confirm; the same day, compare a few random patient cards with the old file.
- For a week, enter new records only in the program and open the old file only to look things up; then archive it or delete it safely.
Do not enter the same record in two places; arguing over which record is right is the most expensive mistake of a switch. If you decide to delete the old file, remember the copies in e-mail attachments, on phones and in backups. How long you must keep records is a separate legal question; ask your accountant or legal adviser before deleting.
How to move past transactions and open balances
Once the patient list is in, money is next. You do not have to move every past payment of every patient; move at least the balances still open today, so the balance list is right from the first day. How a balance is tracked is explained in the patient balances and installments guide.
In Clinigim’s transaction import each row is one transaction. If the phone matches a registered patient, the transaction is written to that patient; if not, the patient is created automatically. The gap between the amount and the amount paid appears as the patient’s remaining balance.
| Column | Required | What goes in it |
|---|---|---|
| Patient | Yes | First and last name, in one column or in separate columns. |
| Phone | Yes | Used to find the registered patient. |
| Date | Yes | The day the transaction took place. |
| Service | Yes | The name of the consultation, session or treatment. |
| Amount | Yes | The total amount of the transaction. |
| Paid | Yes | The amount paid for that transaction; an empty cell counts as unpaid. |
| Time, Method, Doctor, Description, Currency | No | Added to the transaction when present. |
The transaction import accepts up to 10,000 rows and 15 MB per file; split a larger file in two. You can skip faulty rows and import the rest, and download a report of the rows with problems. Installment plans are not imported; after importing the open balance you set them up again on the transaction with Set Up Installment Plan. Ongoing session packages are reopened as treatment plans on the patient card; how they are kept is in the session package guide.
How import and export work in Clinigim, and what it does not do
When switching to Clinigim, the steps above happen on these screens. Every point is how the app behaves today; the whole program is described on the patient tracking software page.
- On the Patients screen you pick the Excel patient import from the Quick actions menu at the top right. Download template in the same menu gives you a seven-column Excel file in your clinic’s language. The file may be .xlsx or .csv; at most 5 MB and 2,000 rows.
- In the preview, Clinigim’s fields are on the left and your file’s columns on the right, already matched; you change a match if it is wrong. Every row is flagged Ready, Warning, Error or Existing patient; you can fix the row there or skip it.
- An existing patient is recognised when the phone, the e-mail, or the name together with the date of birth match. The default is to skip; you can choose to add anyway. The name alone is not enough.
- When you confirm, the patients are added in one go; if anything fails, none are added. The import can be undone with one click within 24 hours: the added patients are not deleted but become inactive. If a transaction, an appointment, a file or a signed consent has been added to those patients, the undo is refused.
- Past transactions come in through the Excel import in the Quick actions menu of the Transactions screen. This import can also be undone within 24 hours; it is refused once an installment plan or a payment has been added on top of an imported transaction.
- Importing is done by the people the clinic owner has given the patient import permission. Exporting is open to the clinic owner only: patients, transactions, appointments, expenses, debtors and the end of day export to Excel (.xlsx). If you leave the program, your records stay with you.
Clinigim does not import appointments, treatment plans, patient files or signed consents; you enter upcoming appointments in the calendar yourself. It does not connect to your old program to pull data; the switch always goes through a file. Clinigim is not a health information system registered with the Turkish Ministry of Health and does not send data to e-Nabız; if your country requires reporting to an official health system, you may need a registered system for that alongside Clinigim.
Frequently asked questions
- Is it safe to keep patient records in Excel?
- The file itself is neither safe nor unsafe; where it lives and who opens it decide that. Health data is special-category personal data: do not send the file by e-mail, protect it with a password, share it only with the people who need it and back it up regularly. If several people use the same file, switching to software that ties access to a person and keeps a trail of changes is the easier path.
- What if I make a mistake while importing?
- In Clinigim you can undo an import with one click within 24 hours of confirming it. The added patients are not deleted but become inactive; you fix the file and upload it again. If a transaction, an appointment, a file or a signed consent has been added to those patients, the undo is refused, because the clinic has started working with those records. That is why we suggest starting with a trial of ten rows.
- Are national ID numbers and gender imported too?
- No. Clinigim’s patient record has no national ID number or gender field; the imported fields are first name, last name, phone, e-mail, date of birth, notes and address. If your file has those columns, the preview shows that it saw them and will not use them. Only the first name is required; every other column may be left empty.
- How do I bring patients over from my old program?
- Download the patient list from your old program’s export screen as Excel or CSV; if there is no such option, ask your provider for the file. Match the column headers to the names in the template and clean the copy. Clinigim does not connect to the old program directly; the switch always goes through a file. Appointments and treatment plans are not imported; you enter upcoming appointments in the calendar yourself.
- Should I use Excel or CSV for the import?
- Either works. You can upload the Excel file (.xlsx) as it is; dates come through in the format Excel recognises. In a CSV the separator may be a semicolon or a comma, and accented characters are read correctly. Save an old .xls file as .xlsx first. The patient file may hold at most 5 MB and 2,000 rows; split a larger file in two.
- If I leave Clinigim, can I take my data as Excel?
- Yes. The clinic owner downloads patients, transactions, appointments, expenses, debtors and the end-of-day list as an Excel file at any time. The server prepares the file; the whole list comes, not just the page on the screen. For transactions, the date range and filters on the screen are applied to the file as well. The export permission is not given to staff.
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