Orders - Subscriptions - Prescriptions

Navigating a new system can sometimes feel complex, especially when you are focused on providing the best care for your patients. We created this guide to make things easier by explaining three core concepts that are central to the CarePortals platform:

Think of these three elements as the essential building blocks for every patient's journey with your brand. An Order is the starting point for any purchase. A Subscription helps you manage ongoing care and automates recurring refills. A Prescription is the necessary medical authorization for specific products.

Orders: The Core of Every Transaction

An order is the central part of every transaction within CarePortals. An order is created whenever a patient requires a product. This applies to a first-time purchase, a manual refill request, or an automated refill generated by a subscription. Each order is assigned a unique ID and progresses through a series of statuses, such as Processing, Awaiting Script, and Shipped.

An order created by a patient is the most common way a transaction begins in CarePortals. The platform's workflow is primarily designed around this e-commerce-first approach.

To learn more about how orders are processed and managed in CarePortals, check out our Orders Manager guide.

Subscriptions: Automating Future Orders

A subscription is a plan that automatically creates new orders for a patient at scheduled intervals. This feature is used to manage automated refills for medications. For example, a subscription for a monthly medication will generate a new order each month without requiring manual action.

Subscriptions are configured at the product level. When creating or editing a product, you can select Subscription as the purchase type. This will enable the Subscription Phases section, where you can define the terms of the subscription, such as the price, cycle duration, and how frequently the patient is billed.

This allows for the creation of multi-stage customer journeys. For instance, you can set up an introductory offer for the first phase and then have it roll into a standard plan in a subsequent phase, each with its own pricing and duration.

Want to go deeper? Learn how to configure subscription products, set custom billing cycles, and manage multi-phase plans in the Subscriptions Overview guide.

Prescriptions (Rx): Medical Authorization

A prescription, also referred to as an Rx or script, is the official authorization from a provider for a patient to receive a specific medication. It includes the drug name, patient instructions (SIG), quantity, and the number of refills allowed.

CarePortals supports compliant e-prescribing through Surescripts, which allows you to onboard you’re in-house physician team to write prescriptions. However, prescriptions can also be sent to the CarePortals platform electronically from a partnered physician group via an API integration.

The Role of Refills

Refills on a prescription determine if a new consultation is needed for a subsequent order.

  • If a prescription has refills, the patient can receive their next order of the same medication without a new doctor's visit.

  • If a prescription has zero refills, the patient must have a new consultation with a provider to obtain a new prescription before their next order can be fulfilled.

When a prescription's refills are used, a new prescription must be written by a provider. The original prescription is not updated.

Check out our Refills guide to learn how refill affect prescriptions, consultations, and automated reordering.

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We recommend exploring the following guides to get a complete understanding of how to make the most of the platform.