Missed appointments cost your practice time, money, and chances to deliver quality care. But there are some things you can do to reduce the number of no-shows you deal with—and many of them don’t even take extra time from your team.
Why do patients miss therapy appointments?
One of the main driving factors behind therapy no-shows is the nature of why patients seek treatment in the first place. Dealing with mental health struggles of any kind can make it hard to reach out or follow through with getting help. Many no-show appointments are first-time patients who still have reservations about therapy. Still, established patients also no-show because their anxiety, depression, eating disorder, or addiction makes it difficult to tear down the protective walls they’ve put up so they can put in the work that therapy requires.
Even if someone is prepared for therapy and looking forward to their appointment, life can get in the way. Sometimes, no-shows are the result of forgetfulness or transportation issues. Other times, scheduling issues at your office, like long waits or inflexible appointment times, make it feel like fitting therapy into your patients’ schedules is impossible.
How to reduce no-shows in therapy
Your practice won’t be able to account for every single no-show appointment. Putting some new practices in place, though, can help you engage with your patients better so they are less likely to miss their therapy sessions.
Streamlined intake
Anything you can do to make the process less daunting for your patients, the better. Reduce the number of intake forms to the least possible and put them all in one place, preferably on a digital platform. When your patients only need to provide their information once (or as few times as possible), they feel like you’re valuing the time and effort they’re putting in.
If you’re able to collect their information on a digital platform, your team will have access to all of the data they need without transferring it from paper. Your CRM and EMR platforms should be able to handle intake forms, secure the results, and get the information to your team wherever they need it in the treatment process.
Automated reminders
One of the easiest things you can do to reduce the number of no-shows is to simply remind your patients of their upcoming appointments. Phone calls and emails work fine, but it’s likely that a good portion of your patients would prefer text reminders. If your software platform already has their contact information, you should be able to automatically enroll them in appointment reminders once they’re scheduled.
When sending automated reminders, be mindful of your patients. If you have a fee for no-show appointments, be sure at least one reminder goes out early enough that they can conveniently reschedule without incurring a charge. You can also send a same-day reminder early enough that they can get to the office or with a link to log in to a telehealth appointment. Whatever cadence you use, make sure your reminders are personalized. You might even have personalized outreach schedules for high-risk patients who are showing signs of dropping out of therapy.
Flexible scheduling
Going to schedule an appointment and seeing a weeks-long or months-long wait will discourage new patients. Limited slots and long breaks between sessions can disengage established patients from the therapy process. When you’re able to be flexible with your providers’ schedules, you can mitigate both of these challenges. If a patient cancels an appointment, your team (or, better yet, your software) should be able to automatically offer it to someone who could use a session sooner.
If you’re able to, same-day and next-day appointments are especially beneficial. Just like reducing the amount of work patients do during intake, it shows that you value their time and reduces the barriers to entering therapy. Rather than being a long, drawn-out process, therapy becomes something that simply fits into their lives.
Telehealth
Online appointments made therapy much more accessible to people during the COVID-19 pandemic and increased the number of patients who kept all their appointments. If your program is suitable for telehealth appointments, you should be offering them to qualifying patients. Telehealth won’t be right for everyone, but it is for a lot of people.
Virtual sessions reduce the amount of stress that patients have to face when dealing with traffic or public transit and the prep time both patients and therapists need prior to starting. Plus, patients may be more comfortable at home, especially if they’re struggling with something that makes it hard for them to be out around other people.
Reducing no-shows with Sunwave
It sounds like a lot of work but, in reality, your team is likely to save time using these strategies to reduce no-shows, especially if you invest in a smart platform like Sunwave Health.
Sunwave brings everything together—CRM, EMR, RCM, telehealth, and patient engagement—into one seamless, secure patient records management system for your team. With automation at every corner, AI assistance, and role-based access, the right staff are involved, but only when they need to be.
- Patient engagement: Collect the right information from your patients the first time and securely store it in Sunwave. If any forms need updating, you can automatically schedule requests from your patients when they expire. All the information that is input into Sunwave can be easily accessed using the different tools as long as staff have the right roles assigned for HIPAA compliance.
- Automated reminders: You set the parameters, Sunwave automatically lets patients know about their upcoming appointments. Choose a messaging cadence, how to deliver notifications, and what level of personalization you want in your reminders.
- Telehealth integration: Host secure telehealth appointments directly from Sunwave. Therapists can easily update charts and send relevant session materials directly to patients.
Make therapy something your patients can attend without dealing with a scheduling nightmare or seemingly hundreds of intake forms every session. Contact Sunwave Health at 561.576.6037 or schedule a demo now to find out how.
