Appointments
Overview
The automation of the appointments process brings many benefits to your practice. The ability to define whose appointments can be entered into the practice diary means you can include your staff as well as patients, making it easier to see who is doing what at any particular time.
Automation of the process also eliminates basic errors, such as bookings made for the wrong patients on the wrong day or even double bookings. As part of the system, the Optisoft Appointments module will also take care of essential routine tasks that, otherwise would take up valuable staff time. Appointment cards can be printed automatically, for example, providing patients with an immediate record of their next visit. As the appointment grows closer, the module can be set to automatically issue reminders to patients. In line with modern communications options, the reminders can be sent via traditional post, e-mail or even an SMS text message direct to the patient's mobile phone.
The likelihood of missed, late or forgotten appointments can be significantly reduced by making sure that patients are kept aware of their next appointment date and time.
The Optisoft Appointments module can improve practice performance in other ways too. By capturing valuable data on staff, patients, the rate and number of cancellations, referrals, Failed To Attend management and other Key Performance Indicators, the module equips you with practical and useful information that enables you to identify problems and take appropriate action quickly.
Before you can fully utilise the appointments module you will need to set up the optometrists, their hours and the appointment types available. See Setting Up Appointments.
Setting Up Appointments
Setting Up Appointments There are a number of things that need to be configured before you can begin to use the Appointments module.
- Opening Times & Availability
- Creating Optometrists
- Appointment Types
- Appointment Reasons
- Appointment Sources
- Appointment Notification