Overview

TDO allows users to send Text messages, use TDO SMS Notification, and allows patients to confirm appointments with SMS Appointment Confirmation 

The SMS Feature is available in TDO Version 12.373g and newer.

Detailed Instructions

Requirements and Registration

In order to send an SMS through TDO, please contact TDO Technical Support and request for the "TDO-SMS Service". 

A contract will be sent over by a TDO Coordinator and once a signature is obtained, a representative will reach out for training - trainings are approximately 30 minutes.

TDO-SMS Fees

Billing for the SMS service is $25.00 for one block of 500 US messages, both outbound (sent) and inbound (received) or $25.00 for one block of 250 International messages both outbound (sent) and inbound (received) billed quarterly. 

Additional blocks of 500 US messages or 250 international messages will be charged at $25.00 per block.

Configuring TDO-SMS Privileges

Next decide who will have permission to send SMS messages. By default, only TDO user accounts with full access privilege can send SMS messages.

If you would like staff members to have permission to send SMS messages you must perform the following actions:

Go to Setup> Site configuration> Edit Control Table> select the tab Application Settings. Look for the SMS options then check the option “Allow Staff group to send SMS” under the “SMS Staff” option.

Figure 1 - Enabling TDO-SMS to staff members

Enabling Roles to Receive SMS Messages

By default, all roles in TDO  (patients, doctors, staff, and referring/general doctors) are set to not receive messages. Each role has the option to indicate if they wants to receive SMS messages/reminders or not. The objective is to avoid sending messages to someone who does not want to receive them. To ensure SMS receipts enable in the ways explained below by role: 

To enable the possible recipients of SMS by specific roles follow the steps below:

Figure 2 - Referring Doctor that allows SMS

Figure 3 – Send SMS option in doctor’s form

Figure 4 – Send SMS option in patient’s form

Figure 5 - Send SMS option in staff’s form

Sending an SMS

Single Message Option

Send an SMS to a mobile phone that is not necessarily registered in TDO. By selecting the Single Message option, the “Mobile Phone” field becomes available so you can manually input the phone number.

Enter the mobile phone number (including the area code), entre the message and press Send.

Multiple Message Option

The Multiple Message option sends SMS messages to one or more recipients registered in TDO.

Select the Target Recipients: Doctors, Patients, Staff, Referring Doctors, General Doctors and Other Doctors are all the roles that TDO-SMS recognizes.

Then select the Filter Type. You may select the “No Filter”, “Birthdate” or “Appointment” filters Type.

• No Filter- the search result will return all records that match the roles selected in the “Target Recipients”.
• Birthdate- the search result will return all records from the roles selected in the “Target Recipients” whose birthdates are within the Start and End Date. 

   If the role has no birthday, it will not appear in the search result.

• Appointment- the search result will return all records from the roles selected in the “Target Recipients” that are associated to an appointment that falls within the Start and End Date defined. No “Staff” entries are returned as a result of a filter based on appointment. Assuming you want to send reminders to your patients only, select only the Patient checkbox, select the “Appointment” filter type and select the range of the dates. 

4. SMS Message Body

You can set the Message Body using two options:

• Writing directly in the “Message” field
  OR 
• Selecting a Predefined message 
  Predefined messages are like letters templates. They are stored in TDO so you do not have to retype messages you send frequently (ex: patient appointment reminders).
  

  To increase efficiency, you can select tokens to be used in the message the tokens in TDO-SMS function just like the tokens in the letters module – when the message is sent the tokens get replaced by actual values from TDO records.

SMS Predefined Messages:

To add a predefined message, click on the “Add Predefined” button. The “Customize Messages” form will pop up:

Set the Template Name and enter the message in the Message Body field. If you want to add a token to the message double click on one of the available tokens, it will be added exactly where the cursor is located.

To edit a predefined message, select it in the “Send Message” form, and click on the “Edit Predefined” button. The selected predefined message will open in the Customize Messages form to be edited.

Figure 7 - Add a Predefined Message

For further articles relating to similar issues, please check:
TDO SMS Notification
SMS Appointment Confirmation  
TDO Communications