Summary
Researchers utilizing text-to-email for data markers, or using a shared mailbox for participant communications, may need to archive emails for a longer period of time than allowed by Michigan Medicine's 2-year limit. One easy option for archiving emails in a HIPAA-compliant manner is by using Microsoft OneNote, which is a product included with Microsoft 365 (Office) licenses. OneNote can also serve as a tool to organize information in sections (tabs) and pages. This article describes how to send emails from Outlook to OneNote.
Options for Archiving in OneNote
There are two different options for sending e-mails to OneNote:
- Set it up so you can right-click individual e-mails in Outlook and send them to OneNote (less technical and quicker)
- Setup an automation in Power Automate (also part of the Microsoft 365 license) to automatically send all flagged emails, or e-mails put in a specific folder, to OneNote (a little more technical but better for long-term use)
Note: One additional option is using OneDrive instead of OneNote. See Additional Options for details.
Option 1: Right-Click on Email to Send to OneNote
Create a New Notebook and Sync to Desktop
- Go to One Drive and login with your level-2 account - https://umhealth-my.sharepoint.com/
- Click Add New -> OneNote Notebook and give your notebook a name, then click Create
- This will open the OneNote web version
- Click "Open in Desktop" to sync the notebook to the OneNote desktop app. This will make the notebook available in Outlook
- In OneNote, you will see a section called "Untitled Section". You can leave it as-is, or create a new tab for “Emails”
Use from Outlook
- To save a copy of an email to OneNote, right click on the email in Outlook (desktop app, not online) and click Send to OneNote
- Select the notebook and tab. Optionally, check the “Always send…” check box to skip this prompt in the future and always use the same notebook
- Your email is now in OneNote!
- You can organize the notebook with multiple tabs. For example, one tab per sender, or one tab per year & month.
Option 2: Use Power Automate
- Follow the steps above to create a OneNote notebook if you don’t have one already
- Go to https://make.powerautomate.com and login using your level-2 account
- Click Templates and search for OneNote
- The easiest template to get started is "Copy flagged Office 365 Outlook emails to OneNote". It will setup a flow (an automation) to send any emails you flag in Outlook to OneNote, without having to take any other action
- After selecting the template and entering your credentials, click the Outlook step and be sure to select your Inbox under Folder
- Then select the OneNote step, and be sure to select the notebook and the section (tab) you want to use as shown above
- Save
- Go to Outlook and flag an email for follow-up to test it. Wait about five minutes, and your email should now be in OneNote
- You can also see when an automation (flow) is complete by going to Power Automate -> My Flows, clicking your flow, and scrolling down to the see the run history. Again, it might take five minutes for an action to show up here
- Note that attachments are not copied with the above template, but with some additional customization, you can also add them. See last point below.
- You can also create a flow that runs on a schedule to do more advance things
- For example, Power Automate could check all emails older than 1 year and automatically send them to OneNote every day, then move the emails to an "Archive" folder in Outlook
- Another idea is to create a "Archive Me" folder in Outlook, and setup the flow to automatically send any emails you put there to OneNote. This second idea is very helpful for archiving text-to-email sleep markers, as seen in our Sleep Data Automation
- For help and tips, connect with the MS365 Community of Practice. Sign up to become a member, then visit the Power Automate Pioneers channel in Teams.
Additional Options
- Shelley Boa, Program Manager for MM Int Med-Pulm./Critical Care, created an automation in Power Automate that saves flagged emails and attachments to OneDrive.
- Reach out to Shelley for the template and instructions.
Resources
About the Author
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Gabriel Mongefranco is a Mobile Data Architect at the University of Michigan Eisenberg Family Depression Center. Gabriel has over a decade of experience in data analytics, dashboard design, automation, back end software development, database design, middleware and API architecture, and technical writing.
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