Overview

This article is designed to describe the implications to various reminder workflows and related functionalities.

Reminder templates, reminder rules, patient reminders, and reminder settings will be discussed.

Overview of Patient Reminders

Patient reminders can be viewed directly from the patient page or from the reminder dashboard. Patient reminders are used as client communication tools, however can also be used as a patient care platform.

For example, if a patient reminder is shown in red (overdue), staff are immediately familiar that the service related to the reminder is overdue and has not been completed yet. When interacting with the client, staff can easily address the outstanding service with the client and do not need to review a full patient history to confirm the service status.

Provet Cloud offers reminder settings that help manage reminders automatically so when a service is completed, the expiry due date is automatically updated accordingly. This way staff can always trust the reminder shown indicates the status of the service. Additionally, Provet Cloud supports automatic reminder communication with clients based on reminder rule settings.

Communicating patient care service statuses and managing patient care is efficient when utilizing the suggested workflow.

When creating reminder templates, it is important to use a template title that is informative enough so that staff can easily recognize the service the reminder is connected to. For example, 'Booster Vaccine' would not be detailed enough to indicate which vaccine a pet is due for. Reminder rules should be defined so there are not overlapping duplicate templates for a patient. This type of set-up may cause unnecessary confusion when interpreting patient reminders quickly.

Colour Coding

Colour coding is present on patient reminder due dates. The colour coding is designed to assist staff with easily identifying the status of a patient care service. At a glance, overdue, upcoming, and valid services can easily be identified based on colour and the risk of misreading an expiration date is significantly reduced. Colour coding is not connected to sending status and solely based on the expiry due date.

Black colouring indicates valid and has an expiration of 31 days or greater in the future.

Yellow colouring indicates the expiry date is upcoming within the next 30 days in the future.

Red colouring indicates the expiry date has passed.

Reminder Settings

Reminder default send method

This setting controls the default send method entered when manually creating a patient reminder. Most commonly email sending is chosen as the default method.

Automatic reminder sending enabled

This setting enables or disables automatic patient reminder sending. If disabled, patient reminders will not automatically be transmitted to the client based on reminder rules. It is recommended this setting is enabled.

Send reminders daily at

This setting defines the time of day that automatic reminders are triggered to send to clients. It is recommended a time is chosen during normal business hours to provide the best client communication experience.

Combine patient email reminders

This setting can be enabled or disabled to combine patient reminders into a single email communication. It is recommended this setting is enabled to improve the client communication experience.

Number of days to combine reminders for

This setting is secondary to the above regarding combing patient email reminders. When combing email reminders is enabled, you can define how many calendar days upcoming are these reminders combined for. For example, if you enter 30, reminders due in the next upcoming 30 days would be combined into a single communication to the client.

Automatically remove upcoming duplicate reminders

This setting can be enabled or disabled. It is recommended to be enabled. It controls whether future-dated patient reminders are unified into a single row within the patient page and the single row is updated with the new expiry date. This is important when using reminders as a patient care status tool. Duplicates of the same reminder would not be recommended.

Remove existing duplicate reminders that are due in

This setting is secondary to the above regarding removing upcoming duplicate reminders. It controls how many days upcoming that the reminders are unified into a single row. Very commonly this value is set as 365 days. 

Also remove past duplicate reminders

This setting can be enabled or disabled. It is recommended to be enabled. It controls whether overdue date patient reminders are unified into a single row within the patient page and updated with the current valid expiry date. This is important when using reminders as a patient care status tool. Duplicates of the same reminder would not be recommended.

Reminder Templates

Reminder templates manage the communication text which is transmitted to clients through email, SMS or other sending methods. These must be prepared first before reminder rules can be created. Reminder names shown on a patient record correlate to the reminder template name.

When selecting a reminder template name, it is suggested these are concise enough for clear understanding by both the client and clinic staff. However, can remain general enough within the communication text to encompass many use scenarios.

For example, you may title a reminder template Rabies 1 Year, and include a message that reads '[Patient] is due for a Rabies vaccine booster'. You may also consider adding a species indicator such as 'Rabies Canine 1 Year'.

A reminder template title such as 'Canine Booster' may be too general to clearly understand what service(s) are being referenced.

Creating Reminder Templates

For further information on creating reminder templates, please reference the complete instruction guide which can be found here.

Editing Reminder Templates

To edit existing reminder templates, select the edit pen icon at the end of the row and update the appropriate information.

Use the check box 'Update existing reminders' before saving to ensure current existing reminders using the template are updated to the new revisions.

Automatic Reminder Creation Rules

Automatic reminder rules are the base settings that control when patient reminders are generated and triggered. These can be created for exam services, vaccinations, blood work, various diagnostics, routine injections, or other professional services.

Reminders shown on the patient page can be created either manually or automatically. Appointment related reminder information is not shown within the reminder module of the patient page.

Reminder rules utilize the previously created reminder templates, as well as other trigger settings to refine when a specific reminder should be generated.

It is important to create reminder rules, just as with reminder templates, that are specific enough to be relevant to the referenced service, however not too specific so that the use case scenario would never apply.

Within the linked item vaccination workflow, it is critical to link the procedure vaccination and NOT the medicine item.

Creating Automatic Reminder Rules

For further information on creating automatic reminder rules, please reference the complete instruction guide which can be found here.

See Also

How to Create & Manage Automatic Reminders

Recommended Vaccine Item Set Up