Text messages, notifications now available for most N.S. Health appointments

Nova Scotians can now get appointment reminders for most, but not all, of the health appointments they have.

The reminders will come in text messages if health providers have a cellphone number on file or they will be pushed as messages to Nova Scotians who have downloaded the YourHealthNS app.

The text reminders will come 14 days ahead of an appointment, then a week before, then the day before. 

Messages through the YourHealthNS app will come a week before, the day before and the day of the appointment.

Scott McKenna, chief information officer at Nova Scotia Health, said the aim is to cut down on the number of missed appointments due simply to the fact people have forgotten about them.

According to figures supplied by Nova Scotia Health, last year roughly 37,500 appointments for ultrasounds, CT and MRI scans were missed because patients simply failed to show up for them. That's about 10 per cent of appointments booked. 

A similar amount of appointments were lost to same-day or short-notice cancellations.

McKenna could not say how many other health appointments have been lost to no-shows, but estimated that the missed appointments for diagnostic imaging were indicative of a major problem, system-wide.

"Thousands of appointments are missed in those areas," said McKenna. "You think about the numbers of appointments we have in our system. We really need to fill those, every time.

"One missed appointment means another Nova Scotian that didn't get access, so [if] we can reduce that and minimize that, it's a huge opportunity to improve health care in our province."

Most appointments included

Reminders will be sent for all Nova Scotia Health clinic appointments, including lab work, diagnostic imaging, mental health and addictions counselling, and testing for sexually transmitted diseases.

People who have appointments with independent health providers will not be included in this new notification system, nor will vaccination clinics and specialist appointments that already use their own reminder systems.

Appointments deemed too sensitive to share by text, including diagnostic mammogram and some children and adolescent care appointments, will also be excluded from the new system.

McKenna said despite those exceptions, he expects most health appointments in the province to trigger a notification. 

"This is the majority of all hospital appointments across the 40-some hospitals in this province," said McKenna.