No-Show Reduction for Cerbo Practices

Where empty slots come from

Not every missed appointment is a patient who forgot. Some are patients who meant to cancel and could not get through, or who tried after hours, heard a full mailbox and gave up. Others booked a visit they were unsure about, or did not understand the preparation and stayed home rather than arrive unprepared.

In a cash-based Cerbo practice, where a long first consult or an infusion chair may sit empty, each of those is time that could have gone to someone waiting for an earlier visit.

Make cancelling easy

The simplest fix is letting patients cancel or reschedule by phone at any hour. Katie answers that call at ten at night or on a Sunday, records which appointment the caller wants to move, why and when they would prefer, and hands it to staff in a summary. No mailbox to fill up, no message to decipher, and no reason for the patient to give up and simply not come.

Staff can then release the slot first thing the next morning instead of discovering it empty at the appointment time. The patient who cancelled is also still in touch with the practice, which makes offering a new time a simple next step.

Read-backs that prevent confusion

Patients skip visits they misunderstood. Before each call ends, Katie reads back what was agreed and what happens next:

• What the caller asked for, and that your staff will confirm the exact time
• Any preparation your clinicians approved for that visit type
• Your cancellation policy, in your wording, including any fee
• How to reach the practice if plans change

Reminders, texts and recall calls

Katie works the inbound side, answering when a patient calls to cancel or move a visit. On the outbound side, reminder and confirmation texts can go out through MedReception AI once your number's texting registration is done, and practices that turn on Sallie, its outbound scheduling agent, can have her call patients who are due for recall and offer open times. If you already send reminders from another tool, you can keep sending them. Katie's role is making sure that when a reminder prompts a patient to call and cancel, the call is answered and the slot can be reused.

Tracking the effect

Count no-shows and late cancellations by visit type for a stretch before launch, then for the same stretch after. Look closely at first visits and procedure slots, where an empty chair costs the most. Judge the change against your own baseline rather than anyone's promise.

Read the cancellation reasons in the summaries as well. If many patients cancel first visits because the price surprised them, the fix belongs earlier, in what callers are told before they book.