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Setting Up Online Internal Forms

Many IVF clinics and donor programs spend time mailing the following types of forms to their patients and potential ovum donors:

• release of information
• registration form
• patient medical application
• financial policy forms
• assignment of benefits
• brief donor application
• lengthy donor application

Advantages of Distributing Forms Electronically

However, there are numerous advantages to distributing your forms electronically, on your website, including:

• You and your office staff don't need to spend time and money postal mailing forms.
• Patients and potential ovum donors can get forms faster.
• Some patients may experience your clinic or donor program as having better patient services.

How it Works

1. User clicks on a link on your site to access the form.
2. While viewing the form in their computer, the user prints the form on their printer.
3. User fills out the printed form and returns it to your office

File Format for Online Forms

You can use the following formats to display your forms online:

1. PDF file (Portable Data Format)

PDF is a very common file type on the Internet, which offers these advantages:

• quick to download due to small file size
• relatively easy to convert an MS Word file into a PDF file
• low likelihood that a person could alter your document after downloading it since they would need a special Adobe Acrobat PDF Writer application
• This is the ideal method for typical forms.

2. MS Word document

You can leave it as an MS Word document, users would download the form in it's native MS Word format. This format, however, has some disadvantages:

• The MS Word file is typically very large, so it takes a lot of time for users to download.
• Easier for a patient to alter this form
• Requires that the user has MS Word on their computer, but not everyone has Word on their computer.

3. Web Page

IHR can turn your form into a typical web page. However, this has some disadvantages:

• Most forms have complex formatting which may be difficult to re-create in a web page.
• You will have to pay IHR to create the web page form.

Security Issues

IHR suggests one of the following distribution methods, from least secure to most secure:

1. Place your patient/donor forms in a directory on your website, with links in your website, which are publicly accessible. Some clinics and donor programs prefer to use this very simply method. The forms don't contain any secret information, so they are comfortable with anyone looking at their forms.
    
2. Place your patient/donor forms in a directory on your website, with a hidden link that navigates to the forms. The hidden link might be a tiny button at the bottom of your web pages, that the average person would not see. This is the method most used by IHR clients.
    
3. Place your patient/donor forms in a password protected directory on your website. This method offers the highest level of security, however, also has additional costs and ongoing maintenance (e.g. patients calling in because they forgot their password).

Feel free to contact IHR if you have any questions about adding online forms to your website.
 

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