Automated Patient Reminders and False-Positives: A Simplified Approach to Reducing Erroneous ‘Cancel Appointment’ Requests
When sending automated reminder messages to patients, have any ever expressed to your office that they did not reply “N” or press another button, indicating that they’d like to cancel or reschedule their appointments?
Full disclosure: We know you do because it happens to most of the medical practices we work with.
The question is: What can be done to prevent—or at the very least, cut down on—‘false-positive’ cancellations and reschedules?
Exploring the Causes of False ‘Cancel Appointment’ Requests
Admittedly, we initially thought that our customers were receiving false-positive cancellation and reschedule requests because patients were pressing the wrong buttons. However, after digging deeper to determine the true causes behind these invalid requests, we are now more convinced that patients tend to make these erroneous requests as a result of:
Being confused as to how to reply to the appointment reminder .
Forgetting an upcoming appointment.
Making a split-second decision to request the cancellation.
In addition, we also find that erroneous cancellation requests also stem from having outdated or incorrect patient contact information on file, as well as from people other than the patient, such as a relative or legal guardian, cancelling the appointment.
Once patients really stop to think about the reminder message and their scheduled appointment, they often realize they don’t actually want to cancel. They may figure they can’t get back in the office for three months.
Either way, the end results are the same: less kept appointments, decreased patient satisfaction , more valuable staff time spent, and less annual revenue
A Simple Yet Effective Solution to Preventing Erroneous ‘Cancel Appointment’ Requests
At Vital Interaction, we understand how frustrating such a glitch can be for both your practice and your patients. That’s why we’ve made it our mission to find a way to ensure that all cancellation requests are valid and automated, requiring little to no follow-up by front office or scheduling staff.
Our solution? A two-step appointment cancellation request and rescheduling process that is now available via email and text reminder messages . In the near future, this process will also be available through voice-call reminders.
This simple two-step process prompts patients to click on a link or a button to cancel or reschedule their appointment and then confirm once more that they do, indeed, want to cancel or reschedule their appointment.
While this feature may add a few seconds to the appointment cancellation/rescheduling process on your patients’ end, it also saves a lot of follow-up time on both ends—and it also helps reduce missed appointments .
Customizing Your Vital Interaction System Appointment Change Verification Process
Vital Interaction’s two-step cancellation/reschedule process comes in three forms:
Option 1: Appointment Cancellation/Reschedule Request with Follow-up
Users of Vital Interaction will receive a cancellation or reschedule request notification. The difference, though, is that the reschedule or cancel request has an extra layer of authenticity. Moreover, schedulers have the opportunity to follow up with the patient as desired.
Option 2: Appointment Cancellation/Reschedule Request Verification with Practice Management Integration
Vital Interaction is actively working with practice management systems to automate the process, greatly improving scheduling efficiency. Users of Vital Interaction can verify the cancellation or reschedule request directly within our new Request Management tool, which syncs with your schedule. Just one click can either cancel or reschedule an appointment.
Option 3: Automatic Cancellation or Reschedule
Patients can cancel or reschedule their own appointments without verifying beyond the initial two-step process.
Additional Options Following a ‘Cancel Appointment’ Request
For patients needing to reschedule, the new two-step verification process offers even further convenience by automatically providing three alternative appointment times. This step has been strategically included to drive higher patient retention rates by yielding an even higher level of scheduling accuracy for practices—enabling them to easily and automatically cancel or reschedule appointments without ever having to contact patients.
Vital Interaction can even automate this process via certain practice management systems to further streamline scheduling requests.