Vital Signs overview
The Vital Signs window gives you a central location to review historical vital signs for a patient and allows you to identify changes more easily in a patient’s health through comparative trending and graphing. Using the Vital Signs window, you can view, add, edit, graph, and void vital signs for a patient.
Setup overview
Use the Vital sign list window to setup and manage vitals signs utilized at your practice, including weight settings.
- Prior to setting up a new vital sign, determine which type is best. To determine this, consider how you intend to review historical vital signs. Example: Only numerical vital signs can be graphed.
- Cornerstone provides you with a list of default vital signs to start with. With just a few steps, the vital signs in this list can be activated and ready for use.
The following can be done from the Vital sign list.
- Add or edit vital signs
- Edit the weight vital sign
- Set vital signs display order
- Copy a vital sign
- Delete vital signs
Vital Signs usage overview
Vital signs can be entered by clicking the Vital Signs/Weight button 
that displays through Cornerstone in the following areas and more:
- Patient Clipboard patient information tab
- Check-in/Out window
- Patient Visit List
- Estimate
- Invoice
- Document Editor
- Whiteboard
The following tasks can be performed in the vital signs window for a patient.
- View weight and vital sign history
- Enter a patient weight or other vital signs
- Edit vital signs: See vital signs editing rules.
- Void vital signs
- Graph vital signs
- Insert vital signs within a patient document
Fields and options
Within the view and entry windows, the following fields and options are available, based on how your vital signs are setup.
| Field/Option | Description |
| Vital Signs column (static left column) | Displays weight and all other vital signs activated in the vital signs setup. |
| Create new Vital Signs set column (right column) | Add a new set of vital signs for a patient. See Create new Vital Signs Set for more information. |
| Hide voided records check box | When this check box is selected, voided vital signs sets (columns) do not display in the Vital Signs window. |
Graph button  | For numeric and numeric list vital signs, click this button to view the patient data in a graph and optionally print the graph. See Graphing Vital Signs for a Patient for more information. |
| Inactive (I) vital sign | Inactive vital signs are listed on the Vital Signs window only if that patient has historic values for that vital sign. Inactive vital signs are indicated by an (I) after the name. |
| ? link | Alphanumeric list and numeric list for vital signs, click this link to view the list values and their extended descriptions, if available. |
| Red abnormal indicator | Abnormal vital sign entries—those marked as High (H), Low (L), or Abnormal (A)—appear in bold red text. |
Comments icon  | Displays when a comment is associated with the entry. Pause your cursor over the icon to view the comment text. |
| Refresh button | After edits or updates have been made and saved for a patient (at this workstation or elsewhere in the practice), click this button to ensure you are viewing the most recent data for the patient. |
Vital signs editing rules
Adding to or editing an existing vital sign entry or set are subject to editing rules using key time frames of 24 hours and 10 days, as indicated in the table below.
| Task | Within 24 hours of initial set creation | >24 hours after initial set creation | Within 10 days of initial set creation | > 10 days after initial set creation |
| Add new vital sign entry (blank cell) within an existing set | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Edit a vital sign entry (occupied cell) within an existing set | Yes | No | No | No |
Notes:
- The time frame for editing vital signs is based on the server date/time when a vital signs set is created. This is not necessarily the date/time manually entered by the staff member. These time frames are not configurable.
- If the vital signs set is invalid, you can void it. Specific vitals within a set cannot be voided individually.
- You cannot add or edit entries for a vital sign if it is inactive.
Additional notes
Setup
- Setting up the Vital Sign List for your practice is easy by modifying the provided vital sign list.
- Your own user-defined vital signs can also be added.
- It is best practice to set vital signs with normal ranges that notify users when entries are outside the established range to ensure accurate patient data.
- The Vital Signs window displays only active vital signs as assigned in Vital Sign Setup (Lists > Vital Signs/Weight). Until you’ve completed the Vital Sign List setup, weight is the only vital sign that appears on the Vital Signs window.
- Separate security permissions are required for each type of vital signs/weight-related task (setup, adding, editing, and voiding).
Definitions
- A set of vital signs for a patient is a group of vital sign entries that belong to the same date/time/staff (provided in the column header).
- A vital sign entry is an individual vital sign value—one field within the vital signs set.
- The Vital Signs window displays only active vital signs as assigned in Vital Sign Setup (Lists > Vital Signs/Weight). Until you’ve completed the Vital Sign List setup, weight is the only vital sign that appears on the Vital Signs window.
Vital signs display
- For the Vital Signs display order, weight is always listed first.
- If there is an active body score vital sign, it appears below weight.
- You can specify the order of other vital signs during setup.
- You can resize the Vital Signs window to optimize the display for your workstation; the window size is remembered on that workstation. Resizing is not available when accessing the window from the Patient Clipboard window’s right-click menu.
