What the integration does for you
Dazos connects your admissions work in the CRM to your clinical record in LightningStep, so nobody types the same patient twice. Your admissions team keeps working in Dazos, your clinical team keeps working in LightningStep, and the two stay in step with each other.
Dazos sends to LightningStep | LightningStep sends back to Dazos |
A new patient record, with name, date of birth, gender, phone numbers, email and address | Who has been admitted, and when |
A new episode of care when a past patient comes back | Discharges, discharge dates and discharge type |
Location, level of care and admit date | Level of care at admission and current level of care |
Insurance policies, as primary or secondary, plus VOB details you choose | The patient's MR Number |
Referral source, referring contact, and emergency and related contacts | Name, demographic, contact and insurance changes (optional) |
Pre-admission assessment, VOB and other paperwork as PDFs | Patients admitted directly in LightningStep (optional) |
The result: less double entry, fewer typos, and pipeline reports in Dazos that match what actually happened in treatment.
Highlights
Returning patients get a new episode, not a second chart. If a patient already exists in LightningStep, Dazos offers Create Episode of Care in LightningStep instead of creating them again, so the new stay is added to their existing record.
Protection against double links. Dazos won't link one LightningStep episode to two Intake Opportunities. It tells you which record already has it.
Clearer insurance messages. If a policy can't be sent, Dazos names the insurance and explains why, so you know exactly what to fix.
Referral tracking that carries over. The referral source and referring contact on the Intake Opportunity are sent to LightningStep. On a returning patient's new episode they are added without replacing the referral source already on file.
More control over updates. You can stop LightningStep from updating demographics, emergency contacts or insurance on existing patients, each one separately.
Also available: a check for required fields before anything is sent, control over which staff roles can send data to LightningStep, and support for several LightningStep locations.
Day to day for your admissions team
Most of the integration runs on its own. Your team only takes a few actions, all from inside Dazos.
1. Send the patient to LightningStep
When a patient is ready, choose one of:
Click Admit Patient and choose Admit and Send to EMR to admit the patient in Dazos, create them in LightningStep and admit them there at their location and level of care, all in one step.
Or open the Intake Opportunity, click ⋯ (More), and choose Create Patient in LightningStep. For a returning patient you'll see Create Episode of Care in LightningStep instead.
Or let it happen automatically: your administrator can set up a workflow that sends patients when they reach a stage you choose, as long as the Intake Opportunity has a Treatment Program.
The patient's Treatment Program decides which LightningStep location they go to, so it needs to be filled in first. If LightningStep requires a field that's empty in Dazos, Dazos lists the missing fields and doesn't send until you fill them in. Dazos also warns you before sending the same patient twice.
After the send, the Intake Opportunity shows a Linked EMR Record box with the LightningStep details.
Patient already in LightningStep? In the Linked EMR Record box, click Link EMR Record, choose LightningStep, search by first or last name and click Link. No new record is created.
2. Paperwork follows automatically
When the patient is sent, Dazos attaches the latest pre-admission assessment and VOB as PDFs, plus documents on the Intake Opportunity and Account whose folders are matched to a LightningStep document type. Your administrator chooses which of these go. To send more later:
On the Pre-Assessment, click ⋯ and choose Send PAA Pdf to LightningStep.
On the Intake Opportunity's Documents list, use the Send File to… button.
3. Send assessment answers into a LightningStep form
If your administrator has set this up, open the Pre-Assessment, click ⋯ and choose Send to LightningStep Form. Dazos puts the answers into the LightningStep form your administrator picked.
4. Keep details current
If your administrator turns on the Update EMR Record workflow, changes you save on the Intake Opportunity (name, phone numbers, address, dates and other fields you've matched up) go to LightningStep without being sent again by hand. Emergency contacts and insurance are sent at the same time, and new ones are added. A policy whose member ID is already in LightningStep isn't added again.
What comes back from LightningStep
Every hour, Dazos checks your LightningStep census and updates the linked Dazos records. Nobody on your team needs to do anything. Here is exactly what changes, and when.
Step 1: Matching the patient
Dazos links a LightningStep patient to an Intake Opportunity only when all four of these match:
First and last name
Date of birth
Treatment Program, matched to the patient's LightningStep location
Admission date, exact or within 2 days
If the Intake Opportunity already has an MR Number, it must match the one in LightningStep too. Intake Opportunities already linked to a different EMR are skipped. Once linked, the patient's LightningStep MR Number is filled in on the Intake Opportunity.
Step 2: Ongoing updates
For every linked patient still in treatment, Dazos updates:
What updates in Dazos | What it shows | Always or optional |
Admitted Status | In Treatment once admitted; your matched discharge status after discharge (Discharged: Completed if no other status is matched) | Always |
Sales Stage | Moves to Admitted once LightningStep shows an MR Number and an admission date of today or earlier, or a discharge. This starts your admission workflows and the Treatment Episode. | Always |
Admission Date | The admission date from LightningStep | Always |
Discharge Date and Discharge Type | The discharge date, and LightningStep's discharge type translated to yours | Always |
MR Number | The LightningStep medical record number | Always |
Level of Care | The level of care at admission, plus the current level of care from the latest admission | Always |
Name, date of birth and demographics | Corrections made in LightningStep, taken from the patient's most recent episode | Optional |
Other Intake Opportunity fields | Any other fields you've matched up with LightningStep | Optional |
Emergency contacts and insurance | New or changed contacts and policies from LightningStep | Optional |
Patients admitted only in LightningStep. If a patient on the LightningStep census has no matching Intake Opportunity, Dazos can create one for them, so admissions and census reports stay complete. It reuses the Account if one already has the same name and date of birth, and creates a new Account if not. If a match is found but the MR Number is different, as with a readmission, Dazos adds a new Intake Opportunity to the same Account. This is optional. Administrators can also choose patients from the census by hand with Manual Pull Patients from EMR.
After discharge. Once LightningStep shows the patient discharged, Dazos records the discharge and stops pulling updates for that record. The Linked EMR Record box shows "Patient Discharged: EMR Updates Locked", which protects the finished treatment episode from later changes in LightningStep. If you need updates to start again, click Unlock EMR Updates.
Your Implementation Specialist will confirm which optional updates to turn on during setup.
Seeing what changed. Every change LightningStep makes is listed on the record's Updates tab, with the date and time. The Linked EMR Record box on the Intake Opportunity shows the LightningStep ID, MR Number, level of care, location and when it last synced. Administrators can also review every send and sync in the Dazos Logger.
Need it right now? Click Pull Updates from EMR in the Linked EMR Record box to refresh that patient straight away instead of waiting for the hourly update.
Getting started: what we need from you
Your Customer Success Manager, Implementation Specialist and the Dazos Technical Services team handle the setup with you. Gathering these items ahead of time speeds it up.
Your LightningStep site address (Host URL), API Token and a Location Alias for each LightningStep connection
Which Treatment Programs go to which LightningStep location
How your LightningStep programs match your Dazos levels of care
How your LightningStep discharge types match your Dazos discharge types and admitted statuses
How your insurance companies match LightningStep's insurance list
Which paperwork to send (pre-admission assessment, VOBs, documents) and the LightningStep document type for each
Whether to send and pull emergency contacts and insurance
The LightningStep form to fill from the pre-admission assessment, if you want one
Which stage should send patients automatically, and whether saved changes should update LightningStep
Which staff roles may send data to LightningStep
Whether patients admitted directly in LightningStep should be added to Dazos
Common questions
How fast do LightningStep changes show up in Dazos?
Within the hour. For one patient right away, use Pull Updates from EMR.
Why didn't a LightningStep patient link to our record?
Name, date of birth, Treatment Program and admission date (within two days) must all match, along with the MR Number if your record already has one. Fix the difference and the next hourly check links them, or link the record yourself with Link EMR Record.
It says "Treatment program not mapped." What now?
The patient's Treatment Program isn't matched to a LightningStep location yet. Ask your administrator or Dazos Technical Services to match it.
Insurance didn't show up in LightningStep. Why?
Each insurance company needs to be matched to LightningStep's insurance list once, and Dazos names any policy it couldn't send. Inactive policies aren't sent.
The patient was here before. Will LightningStep get a duplicate?
No. Dazos sees that the patient already exists and offers Create Episode of Care in LightningStep, which adds the new stay to their existing record.
Can we have several LightningStep locations?
Yes. Each location is connected separately, and patients go to the right one based on their Treatment Program.
Are emergency or related contacts sent?
Yes, if your administrator turns on sending emergency contacts and insurance.
I can't see the LightningStep send options.
Your role may not have the Push to EMR permission. Ask your administrator.
Need help?
Contact your Customer Success Manager, your Implementation Specialist, or Dazos Technical Services at [email protected]. Include the patient's Intake Opportunity name, the time of the issue, and any message Dazos showed.
This article reflects the integration as of October 1, 2026.