Medical Appointment Reminders – SMS, E-mail, Voice. What works the best?

Technology adoption varies by patient age group. Younger patients are more open to the ‘coolness’ of SMS as communication media. Older patients are less likely to rely on SMS or e-mail, preferring a more traditional approach.

When a practice needs to reach out to patients, choice of media varies by availability, price and effectiveness. Something is better than Nothing is the major principle behind selections made by practices when it comes to reminding or notifying patients. And it makes perfect sense. The difference between having patients notified one way or another vs. not having notified at all is really big. The difference is similar to Paper Charts vs. Electronic Health Records. It is a huge leap, even though choice of the EHR may be not as optimal as it could be.

Once appointment reminder media selection process passes first stage, practices should start looking into what would be a better choice.

E-mail is a good way to communicate with the younger and middle age generations. It is the most effective way to communicate. E-mail also enables 2-way communication, sot that patients may reply and notify the practice in case they can’t keep up an appointment. On a negative side, e-mail is more likely to go unnoticed lost in the flood of other e-mails in patients’ mailboxes.

SMS is a good way of staying on touch with the younger generation. Its main disadvantage is that there is no feedback unless patient calls the clinic back and notifies of being unable to keep the scheduled appointment.

Voice call is the most traditional way of reaching out to patients and it has highest chances of actually ‘being heard’. Whether it reaches the patient directly or left on the answering machine, chances are the patient will listen to the instructions. For older Medicare generation, voice call is the most reliable way of getting practice message to the patients. It carries warmth of the practice voice and is as personal as communication can get. Same as e-mail, voice call enables interactive communication, so that patient can notify the practice of change of plans by making selection through the Interactive Voice Response system (IVR). The practice gets notified immediately and is able to utilize appointment slot that would have gone unfilled otherwise.

The main disadvantage of voice reminders is that they require office personnel to call patients individually. However, use of an automated appointment reminder system makes voice calls not more expensive than sending an SMS.

 Setting up automated appointment reminders has become as simple as setting up e-mail notification system. Hosted in the cloud, the system enables practices reach out patients in the most effective yet personalized manner.

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