Target Population

Patients who have missed or failed to show up for scheduled appointments. Suitable for any patient population where appointment adherence is a critical factor for maintaining continuity of care and ensuring timely treatment.

Recommendations

The protocol recommends the following actions:

1. Task Creation: When a patient is identified as having missed an appointment, a task is automatically created for the scheduling team. This task prompts the team to reschedule the missed appointment.
2. Banner Alert: A banner alert is added to the patient’s appointment card and chart. This alert indicates that the patient has previously missed an appointment, thereby informing clinicians and supporting proactive follow-up.

Importance

This protocol helps in:

• Improving Patient Follow-Up: By ensuring that missed appointments are promptly rescheduled, it helps in minimizing gaps in patient care.
• Enhancing Workflow Efficiency: Automating the task creation and alert generation streamlines the process of managing missed appointments, reducing the manual workload for clinical staff.
• Reducing No-Show Rates: The visibility of past no-shows on appointment cards may increase clinician awareness and encourage efforts to reduce future no-shows.

Conclusion

The No Show Handler is a valuable tool for managing patient appointments. It integrates task management and alerts into the clinical workflow to address missed appointments.