Add design history for: exit, pause and resume an appointment (#339)

A design history about allowing the user to exit, pause and resume a
breast screening appointment.

Author: rivalee

app/manage-breast-screening/2025/12/exit-pause-resume-appointment/exit-appointment-post-images.png

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+---
+title: Exit, pause and resume an appointment
+description: We're creating a way for mammographers to exit, pause and resume a breast screening appointment when it can't continue as planned.
+date: 2025-12-23
+author: Rebecca Cottrell
+opengraphImage:
+  src: /manage-breast-screening/2025/12/exit-pause-resume-appointment/pause-appointment.png
+  alt: Pause appointment page state. An important banner says, ‘This appointment is paused’. There is a button to ‘Resume appointment’ and a link for ‘Appointment cannot proceed’.
+tags:
+  - beta
+  - prototype
+  - screening
+---
+
+We've added the functionality for users to exit, pause and resume a breast screening appointment. 
+
+Users need to be able to leave an appointment. They might need to do this in a few situations: 
+
+* There’s an interruption leading to the appointment needing to be paused and resumed later that day
+* The participant experiences pain during screening, or there’s a technical issue in the clinic which means the appointment cannot proceed 
+* They’ve selected the wrong person from the clinic list and need to switch to another participant
+
+
+## Exiting from the workflow 
+
+Exiting is accessed from a link in the top header ('Exit appointment'). 
+
+We've added the link to the top left because that's a strongly established software pattern: the option to close a window is usually found at the top of the screen. This is normally where our site navigation sits, which we hide during [the workflow](/manage-breast-screening/2025/11/a-new-appointment-workflow/) to allow the user to focus on the task. 
+
+![The 'Confirm identity' step of the workflow. An 'Exit appointment' link is located in the top left corner, directly below the main NHS header.](workflow-with-exit-link.png)
+
+### Exiting an appointment before images have been taken
+
+Before images are taken, we allow users to pause the appointment, discard changes made, or choose 'Appointment cannot proceed'. 
+
+![The 'Exit appointment' page before images have been taken. A radio button question asks, 'Will this appointment be resumed today?' with three options: 'Yes, pause and save changes', 'No, appointment cannot proceed', and 'Discard changes and revert status to checked in'.](exit-appointment.png)
+
+### Exiting an appointment after images are taken 
+
+After images are taken, they must be reported. The only option is to proceed with the appointment – so the user can only pause the appointment. It's not possible to discard changes or stop the appointment. 
+
+![Pause appointment page state after images have been taken. The title says 'This appointment will be paused' with text warning that changes can't be discarded after images are taken. There is a button to 'Confirm' and a link to 'Cancel and return to appointment'](exit-appointment-post-images.png)
+
+
+## Pausing and resuming an appointment
+
+If the appointment is being resumed the same day, saving and pausing allows the appointment to be restarted while the clinic is still open. To allow this, we introduced a new appointment status, 'Paused'. When the appointment is viewed, it can be resumed or stopped.  
+
+Paused appointments are considered to be 'in progress' appointments, and are grouped with the rest of the in progress appointments on the clinic list. 
+
+### Adding flexibility and helping users to recover from mistakes
+
+We're allowing for scenarios where more than one clinician is involved in a screening appointment: for example, if one clinician starts then pauses the appointment, the appointment can be resumed by a different clinician. 
+In future, we'll focus on more robustly supporting multiple clinicians in the screening workflow – this is just the start of this work, and there's more questions to answer and puzzles to solve. 
+
+If this feature works as intended, it should help screening appointments to recover from unexpected disruptions. 
+
+After an appointment is paused, and it turns out it can't be resumed after all, the user can select "Appointment cannot proceed" from the paused appointment page state. 
+
+![Pause appointment page state. An important banner says, ‘This appointment is paused’. There is a button to ‘Resume appointment’ and a link for ‘Appointment cannot proceed’.](pause-appointment.png)
+
+
+## If the appointment cannot proceed
+
+If the appointment cannot proceed, and images haven't been taken yet, the user can choose ‘No, appointment cannot proceed’ to be redirected to the appointment cannot proceed flow. The clinician can then select a reason why it can’t proceed, and can optionally request to reschedule the appointment. For more on ending breast screening appointments, see [ending breast screening appointments](/manage-breast-screening/2025/11/ending-breast-screening-appointments/).
+
+## Selecting the wrong person by mistake
+
+If the clinician mistakenly selects the wrong person and starts to complete information for this person, the clinician can choose ‘Discard changes’ to delete any information entered and reset the appointment status back to ‘checked in’. 
+
+## Next steps
+
+### Exploring an interim review step when data is saved
+
+We might want to explore showing the review page to the mammographer when pausing, discarding, or resuming, so they’re aware of what data has been added during the appointment so far. 
+
+### User research and usability testing
+
+We’ll need to do user research and usability testing to find out how well users understand these options.