Encounter
An encounter is a single clinical interaction — a visit, async review, or follow-up — with its own documentation, clinical decision, and outcome; the atomic unit of care delivery and billing.
- One clinical interaction: inputs, clinician, note, decision
- The grain at which care is documented and billed
- Async reviews are encounters, same standard as visits
- In API platforms, a state machine with webhook transitions
The anatomy of an encounter
Every encounter has inputs (the intake or presenting question), a clinician, documentation (the note), a decision (prescribe, order labs, escalate, decline), and an outcome that downstream systems act on. Billing lives at encounter grain too — CPT codes describe encounters — which is why clean encounter modeling pays off from clinical audit through revenue.
Encounters in an API-first program
Modeled as an object, an encounter is a state machine a product can observe: created, in review, needs-patient-input, completed with a signed decision. Webhooks on those transitions are what let a brand show live status, trigger fulfillment, and give support teams truth instead of guesses. The encounter is where human clinical judgment enters the system — everything before it is preparation, everything after is execution.
Compliance handled, so you can build
Lithos runs the clinicians, pharmacies, and 50-state rules behind your care program — one API.
Frequently asked questions
Is an async review really an encounter?
Yes — same documentation and standard of care as a live visit; only the modality differs.
What states does an encounter move through?
Typically created → clinician review → (optional patient follow-up) → completed with a decision — with events at each transition.
How do encounters relate to prescriptions?
A prescription is one possible outcome of an encounter — the signed decision that flows to the pharmacy.