Mailboxes for Lab Results

[solomd]

Hello, I am working on installing PBX for the first time and would like to know if it can be set up so that patients can call in with a password and access a individualized pre-recorded message about their recent blood work or x-ray results. From a doctor's perspective, it is very time consuming to call patients back and get busy signals or find that the patient is not at home. I know there are commercial products out there that offer this specialized mailbox service, but I am trying to save money and still deliver personalized service.

Thank you!

 

[wardmundy]

It would be fairly easy to do. You'd need several inbound DIDs (phone numbers) for patients to call. Each DID would be routed to the voicemail system (*98) which would prompt for the mailbox number and password.

The only trick would be creating sufficient extensions to support the maximum number of concurrent messages you need to distribute. For example, if you have 200 patient test results active at one time, you'd probably want 300 extensions.

To populate the messages, the staff person would call the mailbox to be used, delete the old message, and add the new one.

In creating the extensions, you would want different passwords for each extension, and this password could be handed out with the extension number to the patient when the test was performed. Whether to change the extension voicemail passwords periodically would be up to you.

With a programmer, much of this including password changes could be automated. Then the application could be licensed to other physicians.

We do some projects like this under the following terms. We own the software. You make an up front contribution of $2,000. You get a license to use the software in your practice when it is complete. Assuming the package was priced at $100 per system license, we then would reimburse you $50 on each subsequent license sale until your entire original investment is recovered. We then get rich off the continuing sales. That's the theory anyway.

 

[jroper]

There is also another approach, based on Ward's Tellyapper where you ring everyone you need to contact, with an option to press say 7 to talk to you.

This saves you the trouble of ringing numbers, and the calls come to you, instead of you trying to contact them.You just set up the system to call them every 3 hours until they call you back.

We implemented a similar system for a Telecoms company, although not based on Tellyapper, but A2Billing. It paid for itself in 7 days, and in terms of outbound calls, the month's target was met in 2 days. This is an alternative use of what some would call a predicitve dialer.

This option allows the personal conversation, which may be desirable in some circumstances.

Joe

 

[dghundt]

Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to maintain to simply mail out a copy of the lab results for 27 cents which also contains a brief handwritten note by the physician/provider? Even with automation, there seems to be some maintenance issues. Then some still want a copy of the results regardless and will not want to call in to indicate this, some will lose their card in a public place even if there is no particular identifying information on it so they will probably need to sign some sort of privacy 'release' to use the system, we need to take the time to generate the passcard in real time and give it to them but only if they are having a test done (this may not be known until the end of the encounter), and some will lose the passcard and call in needing a replacement (do we accept who they are over the phone?).

Tech is great, but I'm not sure if it would be worth it the hassle. The best system I think for results retrieval would be a hippa compliant internet patient portal that links securely to the emr. Patients can log on and see their labs, print them out if desired, and see any accompanying message.

Anyone know of existing examples that show real world proof of concept for the voice mail approach?

 

[Phone_User]

Another approach would be to have the person call into your system, and access a custom dial plan that would read back the results from a database.

You would need a front end that your techs or nurse or yourself would be able to enter in the results. You could expand this too. When your patient leaves and is speaking to the nurse she/he could enter in the patients info into the database with the test needed and then print the form they would take to the lab. Along with this would be the one time username and password for results.

So, patient dials in 705 555 1212 that goes to IVR that would say for lab results press 7. They press 7 and at that point it would go to custom code that would ask for a patient ID, then a password. The system would then query the database using the variables that they entered. Cepstral or Flite would then read back what you have entered in the database.

If you need help or want someone to build this for you send me a PM. I have extensive database programing for both the front end and back end.

Rob