How capture starts safely

Who this page is for: the practice manager or principal asking what prevents patient referrals from flowing before the connection is ready.

Available on all planscapture stays off until the connection and service checks pass, on every tier

Your workspace starts with capture off

Every new workspace opens empty, with patient-data capture off. Your team can choose a connection, invite staff and learn the workspace before any referral is read.

For Microsoft 365, Refera automatically sends a fixed connection email containing no patient information. It proves the nominated inbox is readable, an unrelated inbox in the same organisation is denied and the new-message path works. Existing mail is not imported. For an assisted provider, Refera coordinates the equivalent check with the practice or its IT provider.

What Refera checks before capture starts

Refera coordinates the launch work with the practice and its IT provider. Before capture starts, it confirms that:

1. The practice agreement, authority and required privacy arrangements are recorded.
2. The selected connection is restricted to the intended source and passes both positive and negative access checks.
3. A connection email containing no patient information completes the arrival, storage, readback and sealed-history path.
4. Source retention, authenticated retrieval, restore, export and tenant isolation are proven for the enabled channel.
5. Monitoring, alerting, support and incident controls are active.
6. The practice confirms that its staff workflow is ready.

The service records when capture is enabled in the workspace’s tamper-evident history and re-verifies that record whenever it decides whether patient data may enter. If verification fails, capture remains off.

Normal activation is policy-driven. A named operator may use the interactive recovery path only after Refera independently verifies the same tenant-specific approved terms, sealed Owner acceptance, saved executed agreement, practice authority and eight go-live evidence rows. The typed confirmation is an additional human control; it cannot replace any of that evidence. Microsoft activation also keeps its exact mailbox allow, unrelated-mailbox deny and patient-free arrival proof. An approved non-Microsoft path must carry its own separately reviewed connection evidence.

Stopping capture is immediate

Refera can stop a live connection immediately if an integrity or security check fails. The stop is recorded with its reason. Referrals remain in the practice’s existing source while Refera investigates; restarting capture requires the connection and service checks to pass again.

What the practice can verify

Ask Refera for the workspace activation record at any time. It shows when capture was enabled and the safeguards that were confirmed. The practical promise is simple: patient referrals do not flow because somebody clicked the wrong button.

Refera tracks referral admin only. It does not triage patients.