Question

1. You receive an appointment request from Ms. Ying through the patient portal. She is requesting an appointment time already filled by another patient. You contact Ms. Ying, and she informs you that when she requested the appointment, the time was available and she needs to be seen right away. How should you handle this situation?

Answer 1

There are various situations related to the errors in the system and many problems caused by it in the people's life. It is very important for the information provider to seek the proper knowledge regarding the proper use of the system and the advancement of it.

Many a times people face problems relatable to the one similar to this one. Here the patient finds an empty slot while taking an online appointment but which has already been filled before her . Sometimes the system takes few minutes to register the information received and will not be able to show the recent booking done and approved. Hence there will be confusions involving the people who have already registered and who registered late but has been approved in the same slot.

In such situation the health care professional should be able to tackle and handle it professionally.

Ms Ying is one of the similar victim of the system error in which she was shown an empty slot while she was taking an appointment and after the approval she was informed that the slot was already taken by other patient. In such situation we should be very careful on not hurting the patients feeling and that it was not her fault and was a victim of system error. We should also try to convince her that the person who registered first should get an opportunity to be consulted first. We should try to communicate about the information with her and try to make her understand about the situation. We should be able to convince her that not only her but other are Alos there with similar condition like her where they should be attended right away. We should assure her that the immediate next empty slot will be given to her and that it was confirmed by the people manually and not by the system.