Teamworking between our Validation Team – our colleagues who check appointment requests, and colleagues in Neurology, have seen the service’s waiting lists fall, by using new functionality in our DrDoctor appointment system.

DrDoctor Quick Questions gives specialties the chance to contact patients on their waiting lists electronically, rather than a phone call. So far questionnaires asking patients if they still needed an outpatient appointment have been sent to 7,972 patients, with more than 4,000 responding.

Services review patient responses within DrDoctor and view any comments from them, which can be added to their records.  Once the service has checked over the responses, patients wanting to be discharged can be actioned and discharge letters sent.

Access and Validation Manager, Emily Dewey (left), said: “It’s proving to be easy to use and brings instant benefits. It’s a quick way to clean waiting lists, by contacting long-waiting patients and ensure that only appropriate patients are booked into clinics. Patients know they have not been forgotten, can add comments about any changes to their condition and can be informed about average waits for the appointment.

“If your service relies heavily on contacting patients by phone, you’ll know how difficult it is to get in touch with patients. This system can contact many patients at just a touch of a button.”

Medicines Division Operational Manager, Sam Croll, said: “This process has been useful for Neurology. Patients were contacted and asked a number of questions to identify if they felt that they still needed to be seen within the service.  A substantial percentage of patients responded to say that they no longer felt that they needed an appointment.  For these responses a review was carried out by a consultant neurologist, and it was agreed that they could be discharged, and a letter sent. 

“Within the Neurology Service we are constantly looking at different ways of reducing our backlog and streamlining the patients, but this project has certainly helped to remove a good chunk of these!”

If you would like further information, or to try this in your service, please contact Emily Dewey or Kimberley Scholes.