{"id":810,"date":"2014-07-03T15:35:01","date_gmt":"2014-07-03T15:35:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/?p=810"},"modified":"2023-02-10T15:46:08","modified_gmt":"2023-02-10T15:46:08","slug":"sms-reminders-proven-to-increase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/","title":{"rendered":"SMS Reminders Would Reduce Missed Dental Appointments"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>SMS messages are quick and convenient for both the sender and the recipient, which is why they have proven to be such a successful reminder tool.<\/p>\n<p>You have probably been in a situation where an appointment was booked months in advance yet you didn\u2019t remember until the day of the appointment \u2013 or in some cases not at all.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>According to a study carried out by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bda.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">British Dental Association,<\/a> 3.5 million dental appointments are missed every year in Britain, costing dental practices across the country valuable time and money, increasing waiting lists for appointments unnecessarily and in some cases resulting in fines for the patient.<\/p>\n<p>When a patient cancels last minute or doesn&#8217;t turn up at all, it is almost impossible to fill this slot at such short notice, a simple text reminder prior to the appointment could dramatically reduce this risk.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-817 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders-300x249.jpg\" alt=\"sms_reminders\" width=\"300\" height=\"249\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders-300x249.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders.jpg 379w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Chief executive of the British Dental Health Foundation Dr Nigel Carter said: &#8220;A text message is a very simple, efficient and cost effective way of communicating in modern society.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Trials in India have already proven successful with a <a href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/22251033\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">recent study<\/a>\u00a0showing four out of five patients who received a text reminder were on-time to their dental appointments.<\/p>\n<p>Some practices in the UK are already using SMS reminders to improve patient attendance, however, it is not yet common practice for every dental practice meaning many appointments are still being missed across the country.<\/p>\n<h4>Why is SMS such a successful tool for appointment reminders?<\/h4>\n<p>With smartphone penetration at an all-time high in the UK, and increasing daily, reaching out to customers on their mobile ensures you are communicating to them in a way we know they love are confident using every day.<\/p>\n<p>SMS messages can be sent instantly or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/sms-marketing-features\/schedule-messages\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">scheduled<\/a>\u00a0in advance making them flexible for planning and handy for last minute reminders.<\/p>\n<p>A reminder doesn\u2019t need to be more than a few words to confirm the location, date and time of the appointment meaning a short SMS is the perfect communication solution for both sender and recipient without getting bogged down in costly post or filling email inboxes.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not just dental practices experiencing missed appointments \u2013 nobody wants an empty slot in their appointment diary! Have you considered trying <a href=\"https:\/\/app.firetext.co.uk\/signup\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SMS<\/a> to increase your attendance rate?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SMS messages are quick and convenient for both the sender and the recipient, which is why they have proven to be such a successful reminder tool. You have probably been in a situation where an appointment was booked months in advance yet you didn\u2019t remember until the day of the appointment \u2013 or in some [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":817,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sms-tips","category-fun"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>SMS reminders would reduce missed dental appointments - FireText<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"SMS messages are quick and convenient for both the sender and the recipient, which is why they have proven to be such a successful reminder tool.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"SMS reminders would reduce missed dental appointments - FireText\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"SMS messages are quick and convenient for both the sender and the recipient, which is why they have proven to be such a successful reminder tool.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"SMS Marketing Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/firetext.co.uk\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-07-03T15:35:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-02-10T15:46:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"379\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"315\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Holly Barber\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@firetext_uk\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@firetext_uk\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Holly Barber\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Holly Barber\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/fbd04606e14fca821589bba7405e5d61\"},\"headline\":\"SMS Reminders Would Reduce Missed Dental Appointments\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-07-03T15:35:01+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-02-10T15:46:08+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\"},\"wordCount\":385,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/sms_reminders.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"SMS Tips &amp; Tricks\",\"Weird World of SMS\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.firetext.co.uk\/blog\/sms-reminders-proven-to-increase\/\",\"name\":\"SMS reminders would reduce missed dental appointments - 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