Effective communication with patients during crises, such as inclement weather events, IT outages, or system downtime, is essential for addressing care needs and delivering vital updates. Using Artera’s quick and reliable platform can be crucial in efficiently communicating power outages, closures, and necessary safety measures to patients and family members.

The following Artera features can be configured and customized to support your team’s urgent communication needs with patients.

After-Hours Auto-Response

Sometimes, patients may message into your Practice outside of its business hours. For urgent situations, configure your Practice’s After-Hours Auto-Response to inform patients that the line is not currently being monitored. 

Include details about office closures, IT downtime, options for rescheduling appointments, the after-hours phone number, and any other relevant information. Click here to learn more about After-Hours Auto-Responses.

Broadcasts

Broadcasts enable you to send a single message to up to 3,000 patients/per Practice at once. They are especially useful for notifying patients with scheduled appointments about changes to their visit due to unexpected circumstances. Patients who need to be sent a Broadcast can easily be searched for and selected from the Recent Messages, Scheduled, or Starred views in Artera. 

Broadcasts are sent from your Enterprise’s high volume toll-free number, enabling quick and efficient message creation and delivery by all users. They can be configured to support text, call, and/or email delivery methods, ensuring all selected patients are effectively reached. Click here to learn more about Broadcasts.

Campaigns

When Broadcast messages do not suit your delivery volume needs during urgent situations, consider using Campaigns. A single Campaign can reach up to 30,000 patients. If you need to reach out to more than 250,000 patients, please connect with your Customer Success Representative for support.

In times of urgency, it is recommended that Campaigns be sent from your Enterprise’s high volume toll-free number rather than your Practice line. Sending a Campaign from the toll-free number allows the message to be sent at a faster pace to patients and helps circumvent restrictions that patients’ phone carriers place on the number of texts that can be sent from a single phone number. This helps increase message deliverability, which can be important during an emergency situation.

Campaigns can be configured to support text, call, or email delivery methods, ensuring all identified patients are reached. Click here to learn more about Campaigns. 

NOTE: We recommend keeping your Campaigns messages short and concise, especially if sending the message to a high volume of patients.

Outbound Triggers

Appointment Triggers allow Enterprise Users to build automatic message workflows that are sent to patients at designated timepoints prior to and after their scheduled appointment. 

To support your team during times of urgency, it is recommended to configure Appointment Triggers that send prior to a patient’s appointment to inform them of important details regarding the situation and how to prepare for their appointment.

For example, if your office is located in a hurricane region, consider configuring Triggers that send one or two days prior to a patient’s appointment and include weather-specific information, safety measures, and/or details on closures, etc.

These Triggers can be created and remain in an “off” status until they need to be enabled. Having the Triggers built and ready to be turned on saves your team time and effort during an urgent situation where impacted patients need to be communicated with as soon as possible. Click here to learn more about Appointment Triggers. 

Inbound Triggers

Inbound Message Triggers can also be created to set up automated responses to patients who send in questions or concerns regarding an emergent situation. For example, if there is a forecasted blizzard in the next two days, consider configuring an Inbound Message Trigger that will be prompted to send an auto-response to any patients who send in a message including the keyword “blizzard.” The auto-response could read as: “Hello. Safety is our first priority with the forecasted blizzard. If you have an upcoming appointment and wish to reschedule due to weather conditions, please call {wellPhone.}” Click here to learn about Inbound Triggers.