Automating patient reminders

Objectives:

A reminder system to... remind patients
You would have to ask patients permissions and indicate their
preferred method of reminding
database changes to keep this data and the reminder interval
and have OSCAR fire off one or several of (as appropriate)

1) email (dead simple on Linux where most of our Oscar servers sit)
2) email to sms (there are indeed gateways provided by the cell
companies at no charge to the sender)
3) fax (via Oscar Fax if so enabled)
4) recorded voice ( via aaah... Oscar Asterisk)
5) print and mail
6) tickler for the front desk

The front office will love it (well not 6), and your no shows will
reduce as well.

This can also be used as extended as a patient reminder system for paps etc etc

In some ways what we are speaking of is already in place.  The
automated printing or faxing may not be that useful for this purpose
(reminders of appointments).  It is already available by batch for
form letters within Oscar. The email is already a field in the
demographics.  If you go for the full Monty with MyOscar the
communication system is there.

What isn't (I don't use MyOSCAR - its new, so I may be wrong) quite
there is a system for qued reminders.  That is a scheduling system
that automates the firing off of email a day ahead (or sms an hour
ahead or both or ...).  The email or SMS part is actually easy to
program, although for an elegant system we would also want to deal
with messages that bounce.    The telephony is a bit tougher, but
there is Open Source work on that that we can either incorporate or
interface with.

What is hard is determining the priorities for programming and
(preferably) finding funding for it!!  For those purposes (and many
others) you will notice the Users Society and The Foundation at work.