Missed appointments and late cancellations - what patients don't know can hurt others

By Ms. Kathleen Haskell (Army Medicine)December 9, 2013

Dwight D. Eisenhower Army Medical Center averages over 4,600 missed appointments per month or late appointments that were not cancelled or rescheduled.

These "no show" appointments result in wasted financial and staff resources as well as a missed opportunity to provide care to other patients.

In fiscal year 2013, DDEAMC had 55,524 patients that did not show up for booked appointments or cancelled less than 24-hours before their scheduled appointment, resulting in those appointments not being rebooked.

The unused appointments inhibited many patients from getting to see their physician in a timely manner and cost DDEAMC over $4.7 million dollars in funding.

Our patients are our partners in heath and having available patient appointments at DDEAMC is important to us. The only way to ensure access to services is for our patients to know that missing or not cancelling an appointment effects everyone.

No shows also have a tremendous effect on the clinic activities with can prevent patients from getting appointments.

If you are unable to keep a scheduled appointment call and reschedule or cancel and by doing this you will help your medical center open thousands of appointments for other people.

The steps to canceling an appointment are simple and convenient. The Central Appointments System may be accessed 24 hours a day and seven days a week at 706-787-7300. After opening instruction, the options are:

Press 1 to make an appointment

Press 2 to cancel an existing appointment

Press 3 to leave a message for your provider or request renewal of a prescription

Press 4 for a provider referral to a civilian provider (outside the network area)

Press 5 for a problem that needs to be addressed today

Press 6 for Tricare assistance

Press 0 for Operator assistance

It is critical that patients cancel an appointment as soon as possible to ensure that DDEAMC can use that appointment time to provide a fellow patient needed care and if we had been able to utilize last year's 55,524 unused appointments, it would have gone a long way in improving access to care and patient satisfaction.

We need your help in minimizing no-show and late cancellation appointments for primary and specialty care clinics at DDEAMC so we can open access for other patients and improve funding for improved services. That's a Win-Win situation.