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Discharging a case

Discharging a referral means "we're done with this case clinically." It closes the case to new clinical work while keeping everything you need for billing, reporting, and records fully available.

Who can discharge​

  • Practice managers, supervisors, and admins can discharge a case directly.
  • A discharge also happens automatically when a discharge summary is approved — finishing the clinical close-out closes the case as part of the same step. (Approving clinical documents is a supervisor/practice-manager action; admins don't approve clinical work.)

What discharge changes​

After a case is discharged:

Blocked — no new clinical documents, including:

  • Progress notes and visitation notes
  • Treatment plans and safety plans
  • Concrete assistance
  • Crisis incident reports
  • Home safety audits
  • New scheduled sessions

Still works — everything retrospective and financial:

  • Viewing all existing records on the case
  • Billing and KidTraks exports
  • Monthly reports
  • The discharge summary itself

Discharge clears the case off the calendar​

Discharging a case removes its upcoming scheduled sessions from the assigned worker's calendar automatically — you don't have to go delete them one by one.

  • Only upcoming sessions go. Past visits, cancelled ones, and anything already documented stay exactly as they are.
  • The discharge screen tells you how many upcoming appointments will be removed before you confirm, and the number it shows is the number it removes.
  • The worker is told once — not once per appointment — and can see exactly which sessions went, and why, in the Removed from the calendar panel on their Schedule page.
Un-discharging does not put the appointments back

If you un-discharge a case, FCR reports how many appointments the discharge removed, but it does not restore them. Those visits need to be re-planned.

Discharge doesn't lock you out of the case

You can always open a discharged case and read its full history, and it stays in the billing pipeline so you can finish billing for work already delivered. What discharge stops is adding new clinical documentation.

Discharge closes the whole case — every service component

Discharge (and approving a discharge summary) closes the entire referral — all of its service components, not just one. FCR reminds you of this when you confirm. If you only need to end one component while the rest of the case continues, don't discharge. Instead, open that service component on the referral (under Billable Components / Services), edit it, and set its status to Paused or Closed. That stops that one component and leaves the rest of the case active.

On the case page, a discharged referral shows a clear Discharged badge so its state is obvious at a glance.

Reopening a case (un-discharge)​

If a case was discharged in error or services resume, it can be reopened.

  • Only practice managers and admins can un-discharge.
  • A reason is required, and the action is logged and announced to the team — reopening a case is a deliberate, visible step, not a quiet toggle.
Reopening doesn't restore the staff member assignments

Un-discharging brings the case back, but it does not automatically put staff members back on it. After reopening, reassign staff deliberately — see Assigning staff members to a case.

FAQ​

I discharged a case but still need to bill for last month's work. You're fine — billing, monthly reports, and KidTraks exports all keep working after discharge. Discharge only blocks new clinical documents.

I tried to write a note on a discharged case and couldn't. That's expected. New clinical documents are blocked once a case is discharged. If the case genuinely needs more work, a practice manager or admin can reopen it.

Who can reopen a discharged case? Practice managers and admins, with a required reason. Supervisors can discharge but not un-discharge.

After reopening, why isn't the original staff member back on the case? Reopening doesn't restore assignments automatically. Reassign the staff member from the referral's assignments.

I only want to end one service on a multi-part case, not the whole thing. Don't discharge — discharge closes every service component on the referral. Open the referral, find the component under Billable Components / Services, edit it, and set its status to Paused or Closed. That one component stops while the rest of the case keeps running.

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