Reduce No-Shows by Engaging Patients with Salesforce

Why is Appointment Adherence a Problem?

In order to solve the patient adherence use case, we need to first understand why adherence is a problem in the first place.

Patients often blame poor communication for appointment no-shows, and they're not incorrect. The appointment scheduling process is filled with gaps.

• Gap 1: No Initial Confirmation
  Appointment adherence begins with effective scheduling. Without prompt confirmation of an appointment through text or email, patients lack a crucial element for sticking to their upcoming commitments. This oversight prevents them from adding the appointment to their calendars or making a mental note of its creation.
• Gap 2: No Engagement Leading up to the Appointment
  No-shows are often worsened by the lengthy wait times between scheduling and the actual appointment. Without consistent engagement to nurture the patient relationship—particularly in the absence of reminders—patients may easily forget about their appointments.
• Gap 3: No Reminders
  Most patients anticipate reminders from their healthcare providers about upcoming appointments. Without an automated system for this, the administrative burden becomes overwhelming, leading many providers to overlook these important notifications.
• Gap 4: No Centralized Portal
  Healthcare portals serve as a central hub for patients to manage their appointments effectively. Without these portals, patients are less likely to confirm or cancel upcoming appointments, which hinders providers from filling newly available time slots.

Solving the Use Case

We solve this use case by leveraging the automation power of Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

We design patient journeys that begin with appointment scheduling. First, we integrate Marketing Cloud with the provider's practice management system or EHR, depending on which tool handles appointment bookings. This integration enables us to implement automated triggers within Marketing Cloud.</p Upon appointment creation, patients are immediately greeted with a confirmation message over their preferred channel, whether SMS text or email. Communications include convenient links that can add appointments to a variety of digital calendars, like iCal, Google Calendar, or Outlook.

Depending on the length of time until the appointment, we configure the journey to send personalized content to warm the relationships. This keeps the provider top of mind, even if there is a long wait time.

As the appointment approaches, we send reminders to the patient regarding their upcoming visit. These notifications include easy options for patients to cancel or reschedule if needed. Should a patient decide to cancel, we can automate notifications to those on the waitlist so they can take advantage of earlier openings. This approach ensures that cancellations are promptly filled with appointments that generate revenue.