TPP develops text messaging service

Primary care and community healthcare IT providers, TPP, have introduced text messaging to work alongside their flagship SystmOne solution.

The solution has been piloted by Holycroft Surgery, a GP surgery in Bradford and Airedale Teaching Primary Care Trust which was also the first GP practice to use SystmOne.

Using the text messaging addition, the surgery can send messages to patients reminding them of their appointments.

Dr John Parry, a GP at Holycroft Surgery and TPP’s Clinical Director, said: “Texting patients is a great idea. I’ve had very favourable feedback from patients, including those who have received information about test results by text.”

TPP (formerly the Phoenix Partnership) says the text messaging can also be used to send messages about test results, let patients know about any new clinics they are running or any other relevant activities at the surgery.

The communication between doctor and patient through the information in the text message is saved in the patient’s record.

Holycroft has been using SystmOne since 1999 and TPP say the surgery is keen to push the boundaries of the system to see what else can be achieved.

The surgery was looking for new ways to communicate with its patients and so were keen to pilot the SMS technology.

Dr Parry says that his practice now aims to keep the technology and calculate cost savings through its use.

“As a practice, we will be closely monitoring the benefits and are looking forward to the cost savings brought about by reducing the number of patients who miss their appointments.”

TPP said: “Holycroft Surgery is saving time and money and giving patients peace of mind – just by sending a simple text.

“Mobile phones are now considered an essential by many. We organise our lives with them: we get texts telling us about the next train and bus times, the latest news headlines and football scores. Now, patients across the country are starting to receive texts about their next doctor’s appointment.”

SystmOne text messaging will soon be rolled out to all 550 GP practices across England and Wales using the system.

Another practice in the trust region has been using TPP’s Patient Call and Patient Self-Arrivals systems.

The Kensington Street Health Centre has deployed the Patient Self-Arrivals touchscreen system for patients to check themselves in and the Patient Call system to call a patient in for their consultation based on a unique coloured and numbered token.

Practice manager, Sue Mottram, said: “We have a high ethnic population, so we might have several patients waiting with very similar names. So we use SystmOne Patient Call in conjunction with flags on treatment room doors. The patient matches their token to the one on the display board, and then to the treatment room door. It’s a simple system that works and the patients can’t go wrong.”

The screen displays surgery messages when patient tokens are not being displayed.

On Patient Self-Arrival, Mottram added: “With Patient Self-Arrivals patients use the touch screen to check themselves in if there’s a queue at reception. It stops them being late and keeps reception clearer. In our experience, the patients don’t have any problems using it.”

TPP says: “There’s no need to buy additional software or expensive display boards if you’d like to call patients to their appointments or for your patients to check themselves in – Patient Self-Arrivals and Patient Call can do all this for you.”