Patient Safety

The safety of patients is paramount to ensuring the health for the patient and saving costs and resources for the health organisation. Medication errors, which have been projected to cost the NHS £466 million, is one example in which our services can be used effectively. Approximately a third of patients do not fully adhere to their medication prescription instructions because they sometimes to not see or feel the benefit or simply because they have just forgotten.

A research to determine the effect of SMS in reminding patients to take their medication was conducted by Queen Mary University of London. It was conducted using 300 patients and it revealed that patients improved on taking their pills by 64% when text messaging was used as a reminder. By sending the patient reminders at times of medication it will help the patient stay on their prescribed medication course and avoid any omission errors. This saves the health service some money by freeing beds , which would have been taken by preventable situations, and also means less A&E visits for the health organisation.

Appointment Reminders

Missing an appointment may cost in excess of £100 for a healthcare organisation, and costs time and money for GP surgeries as well. The reason a lot of people miss is because of forgetting the date of the appointment. According to Ofcom, in 2014 93% of adults in the UK use a mobile phone regularly or own a mobile phone, which means the best and most effective way to reach people is through a mobile phone. Virtually every mobile phone has text messaging receiving facilities and 98% of text messages received are opened and read, compared to the other social & electronic communications which rate under 30% in read rate. This makes SMS the most effective way of reminding patients of their appointment obligations. We provide solutions that can send reminders by both email and SMS messaging to make sure that the patient has a higher chance of seeing the reminders.

Other areas

Below are other areas in which SMS messaging can be used for the healthcare sector:

• SMS Surveys (Like Friends & Family Test)
• Broadcast campaign information to the relevant crowd - like "STI" testing day info to age-group 16-24
• Filling up staff shortages by sending SMS to off-duty staff to respond when they want to fill a position
• 2-way patient interaction and out-patient follow-ups

Whether you are an NHS trust, pharmacy, GP surgery or dental surgery, we can tailor our solutions to suit your specific needs. Please contact us for a consultation and a quote.