PATIENTS are to receive phone calls to remind them of hospital appointments in a bid to reduce the number of “did not attends”.
More than 9% of all hospital outpatient appointments are missed, costing Warrington and Halton Hospitals thousands of pounds per day.A few days before an appointment, patients will receive a call from the hospital trust which will confirm their appointment details. They will be asked to confirm their date of birth on the phone call to maintain patient confidentiality. You can then press the appropriate button on your telephone to confirm, cancel or rearrange your appointment. If they no longer need your appointment you can easily cancel or rearrange it during the call.
Reminders are made using automated telephone calls and calls made by call centre staff. The system is very easy to use from the patient’s side when they receive a call and is completely free to them.
It’s a service that’s already in place in around 50 NHS trusts across the country. The hospital already uses text reminder services and provides an online form on its website to help patients reschedule their appointment if they cannot make it.
Gordon Robinson, outpatient services manager at the hospitals, said: “Our aim is to ensure as many patients as possible receive the care they require. Every year, thousands of appointments are missed. By providing a reminder, we can help those patients who may have forgotten their appointment and also make it easier for patients who wish to cancel or rearrange their appointment to do so.
“The service is completely free of charge to our patients and as missed appointments cost the NHS millions of pounds every year, the cost of the reminders to us is really insignificant compared to the amount of money wasted by through DNAs. During the pilot of the project we monitored calls and in the first few hours five patients who were contacted had forgotten they had an appointment booked and would have missed it otherwise so we think it’s going to have real value in reducing DNA rates.”
PATIENTS are to receive phone calls to remind them of hospital appointments in a bid to reduce the number of “did not attends”.
Phone reminders for hospital appointments
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Gary Skentelbery
Experienced journalist for more than 40 years. Managing Director of magazine publishing group with three in-house titles and on-line daily newspaper for Warrington. Experienced writer, photographer, PR consultant and media expert having written for local, regional and national newspapers. Specialties: PR, media, social networking, photographer, networking, advertising, sales, media crisis management. Chair of Warrington Healthwatch Director Warrington Chamber of Commerce Patron Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Foundation for Peace. Trustee Warrington Disability Partnership. Former Chairman of Warrington Town FC.
