There’s notifications via email, via call, and via SMS—which of the three is the best tool in setting up appointment reminders for patients?
When it comes to which is the best, it will all boil down to practicality, convenience, ease of use, reliability, and the likelihood that they will boost patient engagement which simply pertains to how a patient is concerned with his/her own health and all the personal healthcare measured that ought to be observed.
In terms of practicality, SMS beats all the other methods. Why? Because SMS notifications are more likely to be read and noticed by patients today, considering people are almost always with their phones. One might argue that email notifications can also be sent through mobile devices but given the odds that not everyone regularly check their emails and some emails could even end up as spam, SMS notifications still remain the better option. The same goes for calls which might end up unanswered, or it could be that patients have a negative response to calls from hospitals. Some might get anxious or scared because of the sense of urgency the call entails and end up not answering the call and therefore fail to receive the necessary info.
SMS notifications are convenient and easy to use for patients. It doesn’t require expert knowledge to open a message and read the appointment details. Plus, for patients who are busy throughout the day and likely have no time for a conversation over the phone, these notifications and alerts via SMS are most convenient.
SMS notifications are also reliable because you no longer have to worry about scheduling when the notifications will be sent to whom, since your service provider will be the one to oversee the process, ensuring that the right alert or notification gets to the right person. And lastly, in terms of patient engagement, SMS notifications are the most effective since they pop up just like app notifications which people are very familiar with. This in turn could boost patient engagement and motivation so that they’ll keep track of their schedules, hospital visits, and more.
Lastly, in terms of appointment visits, it turns out that SMS notifications have shown more than 50 percent improvement in cases when patients miss or forget their doctor’s appointment. Find out more about this and the other benefits of GuniSMS notifications when you visit GuniSMS.com.au.
