Home Forums Discussions General Discussion Who is doing what for appointment reminders?

Who is doing what for appointment reminders? Are your staff calling? do you have an automated system?

Every afternoon, my receptionist calls those scheduled for the next business day and reminds them of the appointment. I have always felt this was more personal and professional than an automated system. Have you ever appreciated a robot calling you? How about a nice young lady's voice? If someone wants to cancel, instead of just selecting that option on a machine, she gives them the opportunity/encouragement to reschedule = fewer lost appointments.

Personal calls are much better IMHO. Also, often more than one person (child) is a patient from one hosehold: so a call saying 'someone at this number has an appointment' does not cut it. They call back saying: which of my kids have an apt?

Also, interestingly, we had a male employee making reminder calls for a while and I was shocked at how many people complained because they did not like it!

very interesting. for me i am all injury and sports med so they would know who has appt but on top of that, i would only want to use if there was a name used. looking at possible texts ones because people like text and it is easier then calls.

Amazing the amount of sexism against men and racism. I had a male nurse for a while who happened to be black. One woman left our practice with her kids because of it. Apparently people don't like male receptionists and often no male restaurant servers can make enough tips to survive.

We just signed up w/Updox Reminders and implemented the program this week. Will let you know you it goes.

I try to call every patient 48 hours in advance, but since this is a one-person staff office, I have to make sure I have all the testing the Doctor ordered in the chart. By checking that well in advance, it gives me the opportunity to get the documents I need before their next visit.
If they haven't had their labs/MRI/CT, etc. completed before the follow up, there's nothing to talk about, is there? By calling 48 hours in advance it makes it easier to reschedule them and fill the newly vacated spot. The personal call is typically appreciated. And since I'm the only person who works here with the Doc, most patients know exactly who I am when I call.

Regarding Boondoc's statement about sexism and racism, I COMPLETELY understand what he is saying. The doctor in this office is African American (and the most amazing person I have EVER worked for) and his previous secretary was a white, homosexual man with visible, violent/angry tattoos in a predominantly "old-world", elderly, conservative Italian neighborhood.
More than one person had been put off by my predecessor and people were leaving left and right. It's amazing what makes people tick...

Boondoc,

I know you know this, but you really don't want her in the practice anyway. As far as restaurant servers, it isn't so much a sexist thing as it is a beauty thing. Guys just are more likely to go to a restaurant with cute waitresses. Owners of restaurants can only hire so many waitresses.

Now where it seems to be sexist is in the entertainment recording industry. I would say a female artist tends to be on the more attractice side, where it doesn't seem to matter at all with males, i.e. Meatloaf, Bob Dylan, etc.

But, the woman you are describing is dead to rights racist. I feel bad for her kids. I wonder what she tells them about our president.

We used to have a staff member call 1 day before. For the past 2 years, we've been sending a text 2 days before. Patients can reply yes to the text to confirm. For those that don't reply to the texts, a staff member will call them 1 day before the appointment. If staff leaves a message, I go back and send another text to the patient. A lot of times, they don't call back after a voicemail but will text back to confirm. Texting is the way to go.

Interesting, Serene.
Can you share what program you use for texting? Or is it just regular texting thru a cell phone?

We have been using Updox reminders for a couple of months. Staff loves it as Updox pulls all the info from AC without any effort from our staff. They only call in person for failed reminders. We are very happy as they allow us to text, email and make computerized / human voice calls.

Has anyone had experience with a company called LumaHealth? They state in their correspondence that they work with "many Amazing Charts users" to handle scheduling? Not sure if I smell BS.
Any thoughts?

This is the correspondence I received. If anyone's had interactions/experience, I'd love a chime in.

Hi Trista,

I work with practice owners using Amazing Charts + LumaHealth to automate a service with your appointment scheduling/calendar software to recapture lost revenue for the practice and complete more appointments.

I was hoping to schedule a 15 min appointment with you, over the phone and online, to show you what the other owners are doing and how it works, and have you tell me if you think it makes sense for your practice or not.

Please give me a call or reply with best number and time, and I will make an appointment to give you a call.

Practices using Luma Health are completing 27% more appointments/week!

It works with your Amazing Charts calendar/appointment software (you do NOT need to change it).

Now you can fill open appointments in the calendar (in real time/evenings and weekends) with patients waiting to come in, automatically.

And, get more positive Google/Yelp/Facebook reviews after appointments are completed, automatically.

Watch this 1 minute video to learn more => click here!

We work with practices to:
Automatically fill open appointments with patients waiting to come in
Text message patients without time consuming or annoying phone calls
Recapture lost revenue from last minute reschedules/cancels/and no shows
Automatic patient feedback, get more positive Google/Yelp/Facebook Reviews
We want to give you a chance to try it out and see for yourself, no charge.

Call or email to setup 15 min. demo to learn more.

Trista,

Did you end up going with Luma?

Nope. We use Amazing Reminders. I like that it pushes the confirmation to the schedule, so the only people I have to follow up on are the ones that didn't answer either way.

I do call new patient's that have already positively confirmed. We book a new patient consult for 60-75 minutes and it's happened more times than we'd like that they will confirm and still NOT keep the appointment, blowing a giant hole through the schedule. I try to give people ample opportunity to cancel with the appropriate notice so I can at least try and fill the slot.

To those using Amazing Reminders and the Updox reminder, can you tell me how much they are?