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Comment by stevekemp | Hacker News Reader

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stevekemp

I went to visit a doctor recently, and booked the appointment online. As a result of that I received:

- An SMS confirming my appointment.

- An SMS the day before reminding me of the appointment.

- An SMS the morning of the appointment inviting me to checkin.

- An SMS after I left asking me about my experience on a scale of 1-5.

That's four SMSs relating to one appointment/visit. The moment I read this post I could just imagine a similar situation - I make a reservation online for a table, and I'll get spammed indefinitely about offers, and invitations to leave a review.

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For a reason. Patient no-show is a huge cost for doctors; it can get as high as 50% in some cases.

They will do anything to fight this. And I am mostly at their side in this particular issue.

This sort of thing can be done really well.

One specialist I've had to go to frequently has a very good system.

An SMS 3 days before as a reminder. Another the day of, which you reply to to check in.

When they're ready for you, they text back, and you go in, and the nurse meets you at the door. (Even ignoring Covid, I'd much rather wait in my car, my with choice of tunes cranked, etc).

That's all good in and of itself.

What makes it really good is that someone human actually reads those messages and dispatches them as appropriate. So whenever I've had a billing question, need a refill, have a question for my doc whatever... I just text that number, and if it's during normal business hours I usually get a response back within 5-10 minutes. (And actual response, not "You are very important to us, we will return your call within 48 hours")

One of the greatest conveniences of my life has been my dentist utilizing texting and text reminders

What'd I'd love for dentists and various things like that to offer is "waitlist" - where I can say "look, I'm available the next cancellation that appears, and I can be at the office in 15 minutes".

I've had doctors and dentists that, internally, would move patient's appointments up if they had a cancellation. It was pretty awesome.

Medical appointment reminders and other medical communications have a special cutout in the TCPA, including reduced consent requirements. They annoy me too though; they're redundant with my calendar reminders. The feedback SMS might not be included in the exception either.

https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-h...

You're correct. The TCPA's opt-in requirements are specific to ongoing marketing related texts and treat "transactional" texts differently.

Except possibly the rating SMS, why is this a bad thing ? Doctors have the problem of no shows and it is good to send reminders. I personally don't mind receiving reminders for something I have agreed to. I wouldn't call a Doctor reminder SMS spam.

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