Surgical Oncology
Robert J. Leonard, M.D., F.A.C.P
We’ve been with PerfectServe for six or seven years. Before that, we had the traditional human-run answering service, with people who had trouble pronouncing the name of the practice, let alone the names of the associates.
Then we heard about PerfectServe and found that we could control our own call flows – individually, not just practice-wide. If one doctor wants to use a cell phone, and another a beeper, PerfectServe can do that.
When I want to communicate with an associate, I just dial a single number, and I have direct access. I can choose to ring through to talk to him directly. Or, if I only need to leave some information, I can route to his voicemail, leave the information and know he will listen to it personally. There are no more intermediaries,
no more waiting on hold – none of that. That kind of direct access is most helpful. It saves a lot of time because it cuts down on phone tag and waiting on hold.
The cost of having PerfectServe manage our after-hours calls is about half what we paid for our answering
service five or six years ago. So it’s a major savings. And PerfectServe’s capabilities are way beyond those of any answering service. You have accuracy that’s virtually flawless, the caller ID privacy protection when you’re calling patients back, one-button callback that saves time and frustration, and much more.
Before PerfectServe,
if someone beeped us when our beeper had just run out of power, or while we were on vacation, the caller never knew we didn’t get the notification. The call was just lost.
But with PerfectServe, I take calls on my cell phone, or use my cell phone for notifications of messages in my voicemail. Since PerfectServe knows when I’ve failed to retrieve a message from voicemail within a certain time, PerfectServe notifies me again. If I continue not to respond, the system notifies one of my colleagues.
I don’t think anyone in our practice carries a beeper any more.
As for scheduling mix-ups or unnecessary late-night interruptions, they almost never happen now. If they do, it’s because someone using the system wasn’t listening closely to the prompts.
The one-button call-back makes returning messages very convenient.
It used to be that if I was listening to messages and I wanted to call someone back, I had to pull over to the side of the road, fumble for a pencil and paper, write the number down, hang up, and dial the number.
PerfectServe
automatically dials the number. And when I’m through talking, all I have to do is wait on the phone and PerfectServe re-connects me with my voicemail so I can continue getting my messages. That feature alone makes the system worthwhile for me.
It’s reasonable to deduce that if you can improve communications between doctors and nurses, and between doctors who are treating the same patient, and if you can reduce communication breakdowns – incorrect
messages, inaccurate phone numbers – you’ve significantly reduced the chance for human error. And less error means greater patient safety. That much we know for sure.
John L. Bell, M.D.
PerfectServe has made it much easier for me to receive after-hours calls from both patients and colleagues. Now the time I spend on call is more enjoyable — and less worrisome.
I like knowing that calling a patient back is not going to compromise the privacy of my home or cell phone numbers. Now when I return a patient's call, the number that shows up on the patient's caller ID pad is PerfectServe's — not mine.
Before, we had to rely on untrained operators to relay important information.
They would have to pass along details about a patient's condition, or messages left by other physicians. But because these operators were not medical personnel, they didn't know what we look for with certain conditions, and very often something germane would be lost. With PerfectServe, I can hear the message directly — in the patient's or the doctor's own voice — so nothing is ever lost or filtered out.
I like the automatic call-back feature a lot. I don't have to fumble around for a pen and paper, and I don't have to worry about losing whatever scrap I had to write a number on. I can just press a button, and PerfectServe dials the number back automatically.
With PerfectServe, I'm not a slave to my pager. If I'm going to be out of pager range, I simply instruct the system to notify me of urgent messages via my cell phone. Or I can have the urgent messages forwarded directly so I can handle them in real-time.
PerfectServe is far superior to traditional answering services.
Simply put, PerfectServe helps me be a better, more effective practitioner.
