And....I can't believe I spend my whole day thinking of these things....but here is an alternative way. I think everyone has to find their own way. Sounds like a Fleetwood Mac song.
Ok, first go open My Computer, select Tools, then Map Network Drive and browse to the Imported Items folder on your server. Now, you will have that folder directly in My Computer.
When you want to make a record for a patient, select that patient from the patient list, on the dropdown menu from the printer icon (it's just consistent with both things you need to print rather than choosing the menu from right-clicking), choose Print Progress Notes. Then select Print All Notes and choose your PDF print driver. (I use Adobe 9.0 Professional so I don't know what previous versions do or can't remember). When the window comes up asking you where to print it to, go to the mapped drive and find the folder belong to that patient. Open that folder and save it there.
Now, choose print summary sheet from the dropdown menu. Print using the PDF print driver. It will default to the same folder which is nice.
At this point, you have EVERY file you need right in the patient's folder. This is nice because all of the imported items are still associated with the patient's records, but the files you printed there are not. It's the best of both worlds.
Now, you open the mapped Imported Items folder in My Computer and guess what. The folder you need will be at the top of the window since it usually defaults to Date Modified. If not, click on the Date Modified tab and it will.
At this point, right-click ON THE FOLDER. You don't need to open it or highlight anything. The menu should allow you to combine the files inside if you are using Adobe. Again, my version does. Choose that, follow the prompts and combine the files into one and save either back to the folder or on your desktop.
