Santa Cruz de Tenerife 10 Apr. (Press Europa) –
The Our Lady of Candelaria University Hospital, affiliated with the Ministry of Health of the Canary Islands Government, aims to expand an interactive communication pilot project for scheduling medical consultations via SMS. This includes the option to cancel or request a change of date should the patient be unable to attend, across its various service areas.
With this new initiative, the hospital strives to enhance communication with users and optimise the management of consultations by rebooking cancelled appointments, as detailed in a statement from the hospital itself.
Over the past five months, through this project, the hospital’s admissions department has dispatched a total of 360,000 appointment SMS, resulting in a twenty percent decrease in absences for medical consultations.
During this time, users responded to 2,300 SMS requesting a change of appointment because they were unable to visit the hospital on the suggested date.
With this text message confirmation – sent seven days prior to the medical consultation or intervention – patients can ask for a new date if they are unable to attend.
The successful outcomes of this initiative for services such as oncology, rheumatology, maxillofacial surgery, cardiology, general and digestive surgery, angiology and vascular surgery, and traumatology will now be extended to other services including rehabilitation and pre-anesthesia.
The ultimate aim is for the entire hospital complex, along with its affiliated centres, to gradually adopt this system, which seeks to optimise consultation management and enhance patient accessibility to the medical assessments they require.
Users of the Candelaria hospital who have not provided their mobile numbers to the centre for appointment confirmations are encouraged to visit their health centre to update their contact details, along with those of their relatives if they are in charge.
They may also do so at the admissions department. This way, they can access the option to change their appointment if needed.
