Mobile phones and clinic appointments: the start of a beautiful new
friendship?
ENT registrars Elias Koury and Callum Faris offer some
evidence that sending text-message reminders to patients before their
appointments reduces non-attendance rates at hospital clinics.
ABSTRACT
Patients who do not keep outpatient appointments are a burden on NHS
resources. Reminding patients by letter or telephone call has been shown to
reduce the numbers of missed appointments.
This randomised controlled study was conducted to assess the feasibility
and effect of using SMS text messaging as a means of reminding patients of
their appointments at an NHS outpatient department.
All patients who were scheduled for an otolaryngology outpatient clinic
at a UK NHS district general hospital and were users of mobile phones were
invited to participate. The intervention group (n=143) had a non-attendance
rate of 6%, and the control group (n=148) had a rate of 14%. In the survey
of the patients with mobile phones and familiar with text messaging, 98%
said they were willing to receive routine reminders by SMS.
The authors conclude that reminders sent by SMS can be a useful
cost-effective adjunct for reducing outpatient non-attendance rates.
Br J Healthcare Comput Info Manage 2005; 22(8): 18–20. |
