Articles on: Video Consultations

Preparing for a Video Consultation

Test it yourself! Before using video consultations with a patient for the first time, we'd recommend trying it out with a test patient as a practice run. This will allow you to get a feel for the new screens, check your browser settings and allow your browser access to your camera and microphone.

Once a video consultation has been booked into your diary, you'll have access to the 'Switch to Video' icon at the top right of the appointment modal when you open the appointment:

Warning: only the user the appointment is booked in with can start the video consultation, and so only they will see the 'Switch to Video' icon in the appointment modal.

For now, video consultations can only be initiated from the WriteUpp desktop site, and not via the WriteUpp mobile app.

Clicking on this icon will take you to a new screen within WriteUpp where you'll see information on the scheduled appointment, an option to copy the clients video access link and a button to open the Waiting Room:

Clicking on Copy patient link will allow you to view and copy the clients video access link, if they have misplaced it.

Clicking on Open Waiting Room will open the secure video portal in a waiting room environment. The waiting room is just that, it provides an area where you can wait for the patient to join you for the call. The waiting room can be accessed at any time, but the call itself can only be initiated within 5 minutes of the scheduled start time. If you access the waiting room prior to this, you'll see an indication on screen of when the appointment is due to start.

The Online Waiting Room

The waiting room will open in a new tab of your browser, which allows you to have both WriteUpp and the video consultation open at the same time. Especially if you're working from a laptop or a desktop computer, this means you could have the windows open side by side, for example to complete an assessment or take notes during the session.

Once you're in the waiting room ready for the call to begin, you'll see a couple of additional options on screen:

Microphone, speaker and camera dropdowns to choose your devices.
A video preview option. Click ‘Start preview’ to turn on your camera
Speaker icon - click on it to play a test sound
Microphone icon - click on it to turn your microphone on/off

We'd really recommend that both clinician and patient use the 'Test video and audio' option before a video call, as it may help identify any issues at either end before you begin. It will also prompt the camera and microphone permissions request, providing an opportunity to fix any problems with access, again before the call starts.

Once the patient has joined the patient waiting area and clicked 'Ready to Join', you'll see that they have arrived on screen.

You'll also receive a notification within WriteUpp itself that the client has arrived for their video appointment, unless you've chosen not to show these!

Once all parties are ready, proceed with the call by clicking 'Start' next to the patient's name -> Starting the consultation.

Updated on: 19/08/2025

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