How Eastern Oklahoma ENT Improved Patient Collections and Reduced Accounts Receivable by $350K

Good people looking for the right solution

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A physician-owned private practice, Eastern Oklahoma ENT has served its community for 50 years and counting. Most of the team has been together for decades, and the workplace feels like a genuine family, says Practice Administrator Jessica Kissinger.

But when Kissinger joined the practice three years ago, she noticed a big opportunity: Outdated processes were holding them back. Everything was done on paper or over the phone, including patient communication, appointment reminders, scheduling, medical history forms, and collecting insurance information. 

This didn’t just impact staff. It created a stressful, frustrating patient experience, with people arriving up to 45 minutes early to complete paperwork in a standing-room-only lobby.

Eastern Oklahoma ENT needed a solution—fast.

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The path to Promptly

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When researching solutions, Kissinger and her team saw a lot of impressive medical software and digital health tools, but most only solved one piece of the puzzle—like referrals, calendars, or communications. Eastern Oklahoma ENT needed a healthcare technology solution that did it all. Then they found Promptly.

From scheduling and confirming appointments to digital intake forms, real-time insurance eligibility checks, easy check-in options, and tracking patients for recalls, Promptly’s all-in-one solution made it the right fit.

And just four months after rolling out Promptly, the practice was already seeing dramatic results.

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Payment collections are more efficient—and effective

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One of the first wins was automating patient communications around billing. Patients who owed more than $100 were sent automated texts with the option to pay over the phone or online, and new patients could pay at the office kiosk. The practice also began following explanations of benefits with messages that included the option for patients to pre-pay—and to do so with more payment options, like Google Pay and Apple Pay.

The improved process, additional payment options, and automated communication worked. 

• In just one day, the practice saw 188 balances paid that had been sitting in accounts receivable for more than 90 days—all it took was an automated text with a link to payment options.
• After four months with Promptly, Eastern Oklahoma ENT reduced outstanding balances by $350K.

(Learn more about how Promptly can help you Recover Patient Balances Efficiently Without Manual Follow-Up.)

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Automated processes are saving significant staff time

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Another big win was improving insurance eligibility checks—a crucial part of the billing process. But when that process is manual? It’s a problem. With 200 patients a day, it was literally a full-time job to review the next day’s appointments and check eligibility for every single one.

That painstaking manual work is now a thing of the past. With Promptly’s real-time eligibility checks, Eastern Oklahoma ENT now gets up-to-date, accurate information about insurance status and can share it with patients quickly and easily, resulting in fewer claim denials.

Yet another headache-inducing manual process at the practice was the summer catch-up push. When you combine a manual, paper-based process with 200 patients a day, you get a boggling amount of paperwork to manage. And every summer, Eastern Oklahoma ENT would staff up to scan, fax, and upload all the paperwork they were behind on. 

Promptly’s digital workflows have quickly helped change that. With far less paperwork this year, there was no need for a hectic catch-up season.

(With Promptly, practices save 1,700+ staff hours a year on average.)

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Schedules are staying full

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Before switching to Promptly, Eastern Oklahoma ENT had already dropped their no-show rate with a digital health tool that reminded patients about office visits and upcoming surgeries.

With Promptly’s automated reminders and pre-visit messages, Eastern Oklahoma ENT’s no-show rate has dropped by 9.7% more, and there’s a bonus: It’s happening with an all-in-one integrated solution that has far more breadth and depth than the previous tool did.

And when cancellations do happen? The Eastern Oklahoma ENT team no longer has to play phone tag and schedule Tetris. Instead, Promptly allows practices to instantly offer the slot to someone on the waitlist via an automated message, and the patient can easily self-schedule.

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Patients are happier

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Before the implementation of Promptly, the frustrating check-in process—the crowded lobby, the stress of filling out paper forms for 45 minutes before an appointment—led to complaints and poor Google reviews. Now that patients can fill out digital forms at home or on a tablet at the practice, it’s a different story.

“We haven’t had a complaint in six weeks,” says Kissinger. “We have amazing front desk coordinators, and Promptly has allowed them to smile and interact more. There’s not a long line at the front desk, and patients are walking into a much more positive experience.”

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More than a service, Promptly is a partner

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Eastern Oklahoma ENT launched Promptly after a detailed process that did more than onboard the clinic staff—it also gave Promptly the chance to learn about the practice’s unique needs and make custom adjustments to better serve them.

With plans to add more physicians in the coming years, Kissinger says Promptly’s scalability is key, and she looks forward to adding on additional features as the partnership grows.

“I don’t think we could get to where we want to be without Promptly. I couldn’t be more grateful for their ability to figure out systems, be patient with us, and give us the opportunity to become a better clinic.”
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—Jessica Kissinger, Practice Administrator of Eastern Oklahoma ENT

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