Auto-Suggest Patient Account Numbers
In practice, the "Auto Suggest Account #" feature presents a suggested account number each time you add a patient to the Innate system. Still, each time that you add a patient you can use any number that you want, as long as it does not duplicate another account number already in the Innate system.
If you intend to use the same account numbers for your existing patients that you bring over to Innate, then can be nice to pick your "Starting Account #" number as a number higher than your highest existing patient account number. This way, you will never accidentally take the account number of an existing patient, and when you add new patients, the setting will be helpful and present a usable number.
That's about it, if the above scenario doesn't match your context, then we still recommend using the auto-suggest feature, but you could use any starting number that you want.
Allowing Gaps Between Account Numbers
If gaps are not allowed, then the system will simply suggest the lowest available number above the starting account number. If gaps are allowed, the system will look for the highest account number and suggest the next highest number (allowing gaps between account numbers), but truly, any number is “allowed” except for duplicates.