Office Manager (Dental): We started using a new appointment reminders program last week.
Me: That’s Great!
Office Manager: Things were going fine until…
Office Manager: The program sent a reminder for an already canceled appointment.
Me: Oh no... That’s not good.
Office Manager: Yeah... the patient was mad at us.
Office Manager: We remove canceled appointments from the schedule when a patient cancels.
Office Manager: The reminder was still sent.
Me: Right… I have heard about this from a few other offices, too.
Office Manager: Do you know why this happens?
Me: If you’re using software like:
• Dentrix
• Eaglesoft
• Opendental
Me: And you make any changes to the schedule.
Me: The changes will stay within your office.
Me: You might have heard about SYNC.
Office Manager: Yeah, I heard about it.
Me: The majority of reminder programs sync your office schedule periodically.
Me: Sometimes, it could be:
• Once a day.
• Every 6 hours.
• Or every 1 hour, etc
Office Manager: I see…
Me: Depending on the sync schedule or if there is a problem with sync, the reminder program may not pick up your latest schedule.
Me: When that happens, the program may not work as expected.
Office Manager: Wow.. that makes sense!
Office Manager: Any solutions for this?
Me: Some programs that don’t require a sync are coming up lately.
Me: They work more in real-time. That means that before sending a reminder, they look at the schedule and send it to only those on it.
Me: That would be more accurate.
Office Manager: Got it. I will make sure to be mindful of this next time.
Has your office faced any syncing issues with appointment reminders?
How did you solve them?
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If you are looking for a reminder program for your dental office that doesn’t rely on syncing, check out our website.
https://practicedilly.com/dental-appointment-reminder-software.html
# Appointment Reminder Service
# Dental Software
# Patient Communication Program
# PracticeDilly