How Physicians Can Benefit From a Telephone Answering Service

A business call center specializing in medical clients can provide the vital link between doctors and patients after normal business hours. Staff trained in this type of answering service phone work can take information regarding a patient’s condition and notify the doctor if necessary, and they can take trauma alert ETA information, so medical personnel and equipment can be ready when critically ill patients arrive in the emergency room. In less urgent cases, they can perform stat calls for patients requiring the periodic recording of information. If lab results come in at odd times, trained medical operators can take the information and hold it until the medical staff is available.

Every doctor knows that time will always be a problem in their profession. Illnesses cannot tell time, and they do not always strike at a convenient moment. As much as they would like to, no doctor can be with his or her patients every time they are needed.

A medical business call center can provide the next best thing. Here, professional operators are trained in taking accurate information and making that crucial judgment call—whether or not to call the doctor. This is a very specialized type of answering service phone work, and the operators can usually tell the difference between a standard health-related call and a real emergency.

A well-trained operator will greet patients and get preliminary information, so if the call requires the attention of medical personnel, they will have the proper information at hand. As an additional precaution, calls are generally recorded to clear up any ambiguities and to protect the medical facility and its staff in the event of a misunderstanding by an operator. Operators understand the importance of both the patient’s privacy and the physician’s reputation, so full confidentiality is observed.

Besides being the voice of the clinic after hours, a medical business call center can be used during business hours to take some of the load off busy office staff. The call service can be the first voice the patient encounters, always professional and never in a hurry or distracted by something else. Desk staff often have to multitask, but the operators of an answering service have no duties except dealing with each call consistently.

A call service can be integrated into a voice mail system as one of several options. In this way, routine calls such as prescription refills or appointment cancellations can go to a recording for further instructions, and more immediate or complicated issues can go to a human operator.

As part of such a system, a medical answering service phone center can provide something that is harder to define, but possibly just as important. Since more mundane matters have been routed to voice mail, the calls that make it to a human operator are generally true emergencies.

In this situation, the importance of having a human operator becomes apparent. In moments of physical suffering and mental anguish, the presence of a competent, professional voice can be an enormous comfort. The job of taking calls could be handled by voice mail, but this human touch can only be provided by a real operator.

A medical call center service helps the medical practitioner, the patient and the clinic. From the intangible to the practical, these centers help doctors and patients come together better and more effectively.