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A care area is a statement about your building: which departments this hospital runs. The screen says so itself — “These control what appears in navigation.” A hospital with no operating theatre should not have a Theatre group in its sidebar, a Theatre tab in its settings, or a Theatre report nobody will ever open.

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Switch an area on or off

1

Open Facility

The Facility card lists your areas under two headings: Clinical units and Operational units.
2

Toggle the area

Turning one on gives Area enabled — “It now appears in navigation.” Turning one off gives Area hidden — “It no longer appears in navigation. Existing records stay accessible by direct link.”
3

Tell your staff

The change applies to everyone in the workspace, not just you. Somebody who had a page bookmarked will find it gone from their sidebar.

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The areas, and their defaults

Theatre is the only one that starts off, because most sites that sign up do not operate. If you have a theatre, switch it on before you try to book a case.

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Turning one off removes three things at once

This is the part worth knowing before you flip a switch. A care area is not just a menu — it is the department, and the department’s navigation group, settings tab and analytics report go together. A hospital that switches off Surgical theatre loses the Theatre group from the sidebar, the Theatre tab from Settings, and the Theatre report from analytics. All three, at once, for everyone.
Inventory and the Store are different surfaces. The Inventory area covers stock, purchase orders and consumables; the Store is a revenue surface with its own gating and stays where it is. The screen makes the same point: “Stock, purchase orders and consumables. The Store is separate.”

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What is always there

Some parts of the hospital have no care-area switch, because every hospital on the enterprise plan runs them: triage, consultation, clinical notes and telehealth. If one of those is missing for a person, it is their role or their permissions, not a care area — work down Who can see and do what. Settings and the audit log also stay reachable whatever you switch off.

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Nothing is deleted

Switching an area off hides it from everyone in this hospital immediately — including staff who are mid-shift in that department. It does not delete anything: “existing records stay reachable by direct link”, and switching the area back on restores its navigation, settings and reports exactly as they were. Do not use this to end a shift, and do not switch off In-patient care while there are patients on a ward.

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Check it worked

  • The sidebar no longer lists the group you switched off — refresh if it is still there.
  • The matching tab has gone from Settings.
  • The matching report has gone from your analytics. See Analytics.
  • An area you switched on appears for your staff too, not only for you.

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If something goes wrong

Care areas are on the enterprise plan of the Clinic & Hospital edition only. A solo or team plan has a single flat navigation with no departments to switch. See Plans and what they include.
Care areas are one gate of several. Check their role can open the pages (Roles), and that role-based navigation is not excluding the section for them.
Then it is the plan, the role or role-based navigation rather than the care area. Compare against an owner’s sidebar — an owner is never restricted by role navigation, so if the owner sees it, the difference is per-role.
Front desk carries registration and contacts as well as the check-in board. Switch it back on; nothing was lost.
The Theatre permission group only appears while the Surgical theatre area is on. Switch it on, then set the permissions — see Permissions.

Set up your hospital

The wider enterprise setup, of which care areas are one step.

Roles

Role-based navigation, the other control over what appears in the sidebar.

Permissions

What people may do inside the departments you run.

Settings

Everything else on the settings rail.