A case conference note records an interdisciplinary team meeting or family care conference about one patient: who attended, what each discipline reported, the options, the decisions, and who does what by when. Copy the free template, see a primary care conference for heart failure with repeated admissions and an early psychosis team meeting, and check what goes in each part.
Blank case conference note template
FreeCASE CONFERENCE NOTE Patient: [Name, date of birth, or ID] Date: [Date] Start and end time: [Times, and total minutes] Conference type: [Team case conference, family care conference, discharge planning meeting, or planned review] Format: [In person, video, phone, or a mix] Chair: [Name, role] Note written by: [Name, role] ATTENDANCE Present: [Each person's name, role, and organization, and how they joined] Patient: [Present for all or part, or not present and why] Family and supports: [Names and relationship, or none] Interpreter: [Language and name, or not needed] Invited, not present: [Name, role, and any written input sent] CONSENT Patient agreed to: [The conference, who took part, and what could be shared with them] If the patient lacks capacity: [Who agreed for the patient, and on what authority] Limits set by the patient: [Topics or copies the patient asked to keep from family or agencies, or none] PURPOSE Why now: [The trigger: repeated admissions, a discharge, a stalled plan, a new risk, or a family request] Questions for today: [The decisions the team needs to reach] Last conference: [Date, or first conference] SITUATION BY DISCIPLINE Physician or nurse practitioner: [Diagnoses, recent events, results, and current medicines] Nursing: [Symptoms, self-care, monitoring, and what the nurse has seen at home or on the unit] Pharmacy: [Medicine review findings: duplicates, interactions, adherence, cost] Therapy: [Occupational, physical, or speech therapy findings and function] Social work or case management: [Housing, income, caregiving, school or work, and services in place] Other services: [Home care, housing, school, or other agencies, and who reported] GOALS Patient's goals: [What the patient wants, in their words] Family's view: [Each person's hopes and worries, under their name] Strengths and supports: [People, skills, and services already helping] Advance care plan: [Wishes or decision-maker on file that bear on today's decisions, or none] OPTIONS DISCUSSED Option 1: [What it is, who raised it, benefits and risks] Option 2: [What it is, who raised it, benefits and risks] Option 3: [What it is, who raised it, benefits and risks, or none] DECISIONS Decision 1: [What was decided, and why] Decision 2: [What was decided, and why] Patient's response: [Agreed, agreed with changes, or declined, in their words] ACTIONS Action 1: [Task, owner, due date] Action 2: [Task, owner, due date] Action 3: [Task, owner, due date] Patient and family tasks: [Task, who, due date] DISAGREEMENTS Points not agreed: [Who held which view, and their reasons] How handled: [Compromise, a trial with a review date, the patient's decision respected, a second opinion, or an ethics consult] FOLLOW-UP Plan updated: [Care plan or treatment plan changed, and where it is kept] Copies to: [Patient, family, team members, and agencies, as consent allows] Next conference: [Date, time, format, and what would bring it forward] Signed: [Name, role, date and time]
Use it for
Each one follows the template. Use them to judge how much detail every part needs.
Primary care team conference at the clinic, with the patient and her daughter, 45 minutes
November 5, 2:00 to 2:45 p.m., clinic meeting room; home care joined by video. Chair: family physician. Present: the family physician, the practice nurse, the clinic pharmacist, the home care coordinator, the patient, an 84-year-old widow who lives alone in an apartment, and her daughter. Note by the practice nurse. Invited, not present: her cardiologist, who sent written advice. Consent: she agreed to the meeting, to her daughter hearing everything, and to the plan going to home care and her community pharmacy.
Three hospital admissions for heart failure with fluid overload in 4 months, in August, September, and October; the last lasted 6 days. Each time she went home on the same plan and was back within 5 weeks. Questions for today: why the plan isn’t holding at home, how to make her medicines manageable, how to catch fluid gain early, and whether she has enough help. First conference.
Family physician: heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, LVEF 30% on the September echo; atrial fibrillation on apixaban; chronic kidney disease, eGFR 41; knee osteoarthritis. Discharge weight on October 28: 61.5 kg. In clinic on November 3: weight 63.0 kg, pulse 52, mild ankle swelling, chest clear. Pharmacist: home medicine review on November 4 found 13 medicines taken at 5 times a day. Bisoprolol was started in hospital, but her old metoprolol was still in the cupboard, and she had taken both on some days. She was also taking over-the-counter naproxen for her knees, and skipping her 6 p.m. furosemide so she wouldn’t be up at night. Nurse: no scale at home, so no weights since discharge. Canned soup and frozen meals most days. MoCA 23 in September; she misses doses when her routine changes. Home care coordinator: 3 hours a week now, one bath visit on Fridays. No one sees her on the other days.
Patient: “I want to stay in my own apartment, and I don’t want to go back to the hospital.” She wants to keep her Wednesday lunch at church, the day she also skips her morning water pill. Daughter: lives 30 minutes away and works full time; visits on Sundays. Worried that her mother is alone most days and that the next admission will be worse. Strengths: knows her pharmacist well, keeps every appointment, and her neighbor checks on her most evenings. Her advance care plan from last year still stands; not revisited today.
1. Simplify medicines and use weekly blister packs from her pharmacy; raised by the pharmacist. 2. Daily weights with a written plan for gain; raised by the nurse. 3. More home care for morning medicines and weighing; raised by the home care coordinator. 4. A referral to the hospital heart failure clinic, advised in the cardiologist’s letter. 5. A move to assisted living, raised by her daughter: help every day, but she doesn’t want to move, and options 1 to 3 have not been tried.
1. Stop metoprolol and naproxen; regular acetaminophen for her knees instead. 2. Furosemide moved from 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. and 2 p.m., same dose; on Wednesdays she takes both doses, the second when she gets home from lunch. 3. Weekly blister packs, with every medicine at 2 times a day instead of 5. 4. Weigh every morning after the toilet and before breakfast, and write it on a chart on the fridge. Target 61.5 kg. If her weight is up 2 kg, about 4 lb, in 3 days, or she is more breathless or swollen, she or home care calls the clinic nurse that day. 5. Home care up from 3 to 10 hours a week: a 1-hour visit every morning for medicines, weighing, and breakfast, plus the Friday bath. 6. Low-salt meal delivery 5 days a week. 7. Heart failure clinic referral. She agreed: “If it keeps me home, I’ll do it.”
Pharmacist: send the new medicine list to her community pharmacy, and take the metoprolol and naproxen out of her home, by November 7. Family physician: heart failure clinic referral by November 7; kidney function, potassium, pulse, and blood pressure at her visit on November 12. Daughter: buy a digital scale and bring it by November 8; set up the meal delivery by November 10. Home care coordinator: request sent today; morning visits start November 10, when the first blister pack arrives. Practice nurse: home visit on November 10 to teach weighing and set up the chart; phone call every Monday and Thursday for 4 weeks. Patient: weigh every morning and call the nurse if her weight is up 2 kg.
Her daughter felt assisted living would be safer now. The patient declined: “I’m not leaving my home.” She repeated back the risks the team described, including another admission, and gave her reasons. The team’s view was that the changes above should come first. Agreed: a 6-week trial. If she is admitted again before then, the team meets sooner, with assisted living on the agenda. Her daughter accepted this. Chronic care plan updated today. Copies to the patient, her daughter, home care, and her pharmacy. Next conference December 17, 2 p.m., same team, home care by video.
Early psychosis program, team meeting with the client and his parents, 60 minutes
November 4, 10:00 to 11:00 a.m., program office; his father joined by video. Chair: case manager. Present: the client, a 22-year-old man; his mother and father; the program psychiatrist; his case manager; the program occupational therapist; and his peer support worker. Note by the case manager. Consent: he agreed to his parents taking part and to the case manager contacting his college’s accessibility office. He asked that his parents get the action list only, not the full note.
Planned review in the early psychosis program. Psychosis began in June, with 3 weeks in hospital in July. Working diagnosis: schizophreniform disorder, to be reviewed in December. Voices have stopped and he no longer believes his neighbors are watching him, but he misses doses, withdrew from college in September, and moved back in with his parents. Questions for today: where he will live, whether and how he returns to college in January, and a plan to help him take his medicine. Last conference: August 12, before discharge.
Psychiatrist: positive symptoms gone since August on aripiprazole 10 mg each evening. He feels restless in the evenings and can’t settle, and by his own count misses 3 or 4 doses a week. Weight up 2 kg since starting; 3-month metabolic blood work normal. Cannabis daily before admission; now 2 or 3 evenings a week. Case manager: the lease on his shared apartment ended in October. Gets along with his parents but wants his own place. Can re-enroll in his business program for January; registration closes December 1. Occupational therapist: sleeps from about 3 a.m. to noon. Reads for 20 minutes before losing focus. Cooks simple meals; no structure to his days. Peer support worker: meets him weekly. He wants to “get back to normal” and feels left behind by his friends.
Client: “I want to be back at school in January, and not be the guy who got sick.” Wants his own place by summer, and no more weight gain. Mother: afraid of another episode; wants him home through the winter. Father: wants him back at college, but part time. Both want him to stop cannabis. Strengths: did well in his first year, close to his younger sister, plays guitar, and has come to every appointment since discharge.
Medicine, from the psychiatrist: take it in the morning with a weekly pill organizer and a phone alarm; a dose change if the restlessness persists; or a monthly long-acting injection of aripiprazole, which removes daily doses. He explained that missed doses and cannabis both raise the risk of relapse. School: back full time in January, part time with 2 courses, or wait until September. Housing: stay with his parents for the winter term, a shared room near campus now, or the program’s supported housing list.
1. Aripiprazole 10 mg moved to the morning. He fills a weekly pill organizer himself on Sundays and sets a 9 a.m. alarm. 2. Back to college part time in January, 2 courses, with exam accommodations through the accessibility office. 3. Stays with his parents through the winter term; looks at shared housing near campus for May. 4. Cannabis: he agreed to none on weeknights, and to one meeting with the program’s substance use worker. 5. Routine: wake time 30 minutes earlier each week until he is up by 9 a.m., and study blocks of 25 minutes. He agreed: “Two courses I can do.”
Case manager: letter to the accessibility office, with his consent, by November 14; help him re-enroll before December 1. Client: book his accessibility intake by November 21; fill the organizer every Sunday; alarm starts tomorrow. Psychiatrist: appointments November 18 and December 2 for restlessness and missed doses; weight and waist at each visit. Occupational therapist: weekly sessions from November 11 on sleep and a study routine, with a practice study block at the campus library before December 19. Peer support worker: go with him to the campus visit. Parents: no dose reminders unless he asks. If they see his warning signs, sleeping under 5 hours, staying in his room, or thinking people online are talking about him, they call the program that day; after hours, the crisis line or 988, call or text.
His parents preferred the monthly injection, so doses can’t be missed. He did not want it: “I don’t want a needle every month. Let me try the pill first.” The psychiatrist supported a trial of his choice. Agreed: if he misses more than 2 doses a week over the next 4 weeks, by the pill organizer count, the injection is back on the table at his December 2 appointment. His parents accepted this. They also wanted him to stop cannabis completely; he agreed only to weeknights, and that stays between him and the substance use worker. Treatment plan updated today. Copies: full note to the team; action list to his parents. Next conference January 6, 10 a.m., before classes start.
Who was in the meeting, in what role, and what the patient agreed to. Readers use it to know whose view each line reflects.
Avoid: “Team present.” Name each person and role. When a conference note is reviewed or paid for, attendance is the first thing checked.
Why the team met now, and the questions it set out to answer.
Avoid: A purpose so broad it can’t be met, such as “discuss care.” Questions make it clear at the end whether the meeting answered them.
A short update from each team member, labeled by discipline, so every fact has a source.
Avoid: Pasting each discipline’s full assessment into the note. Summarize what bears on today’s questions, and say where the full record is.
What the patient wants, in their words, and what the family hopes for and worries about, kept apart.
Avoid: Merging the patient’s and the family’s views into one line. When they differ, the note should show it.
The choices the team weighed, what was decided, and why.
Avoid: Recording what was discussed without what was decided. A reader should find every decision in one place.
Every task from the meeting, each with one owner and a due date.
Avoid: “Home care to increase hours.” Write who sends the request, the new hours, and the start date.
Where people didn’t agree, how it was handled, and when the team meets again.
Avoid: “Team in agreement” when someone wasn’t. An honest record of the disagreement protects the patient and the team.
A record of who said what leaves readers guessing what changed. Close each question from the purpose with a decision, or say it was left open and why.
Tasks written as “to be arranged” fall between services. Give each one a named owner and a date, and check them at the next conference.
If the patient wasn’t there, record how their view was gathered, and how and when the decisions will be shared with them.
Write who disagreed, about what, and how it was settled or left. A family that felt heard in the note is easier to work with at the next meeting.
Send the note only to the people and agencies the patient agreed to. A family member may get the action list without the full discussion.
Some public plans and insurers pay for case conferences, but only when the note shows the start and end times, each person’s role, and consent. Check what your plan asks for.
Vero Scribe writes the case conference note in your template from the meeting, with the consent of the patient and everyone present, or from your dictation afterward. You review and edit every section, then copy it into your record or export it to Word or PDF. Vero works in 60+ languages.
The record of a planned meeting about one patient between the professionals involved in their care and, often, the patient and family. It shows who attended, what each discipline reported, the options and decisions, and each action’s owner and due date. It is also called an interdisciplinary team meeting note, a multidisciplinary team note, or a care conference note.
Start with the date, the start and end times, and everyone present with their role. Record consent and the questions the meeting set out to answer. Summarize each discipline’s update, then the patient’s and family’s goals, the options weighed, and the decisions. End with the actions, any disagreements, and the next meeting. Write it the same day.
The same way, with the family’s views kept under each person’s name and apart from the patient’s. If the patient can’t take part, record who speaks for them, on what authority, and what is known of the patient’s own wishes. Note what the family was told and what they asked.
A care plan is the standing plan: goals, targets, and who does what over months. A case conference note records one meeting: what was reported, what was decided, and why. The decisions then go into the care plan or treatment plan, and the note says so.
Not always, but offer them the chance, and let their goals shape the decisions. Ask for their consent before family or outside agencies take part, or ask the person who decides for them if they lack capacity. If they don’t attend, record why and how their view was gathered.
In some places, yes. Some public plans and insurers pay physicians and other clinicians for case conferences, usually with conditions such as a minimum time, the roles that must take part, and the patient’s consent. Rules differ by plan, so check yours, and record the times, each person’s role, and consent in every note.
Yes. Copy it, or download it as a Word or text file. No account needed.
The SOAP note reordered: assessment and plan on top, with the history and findings below to back them.
For clinical phone calls and nurse triage: the caller, red flags, advice, disposition, and who calls back.
The chart note for a refill or renewal between visits: last fill, monitoring due, safety checks, the decision, and who approved it.
Your chart note on a lab or imaging result: the value and trend, urgency, action, patient contact, and tracking.
For bedside and clinic procedures: indication, consent, time-out, technique, findings, specimens, complications, and aftercare.
Team meetings, handoffs, and follow-ups with clear action owners, drafted for your review.
Case notes and care plan drafts from your conversations, for you to review.
A template and checklist for comparing medicine lists from every source.
Vero writes your notes and letters in the templates you choose, so you review instead of type.
No credit card required. 10 free actions every month.