Azizova Tamara

I created two types of workflows: the first illustrates the appointment booking journey from the moment a patient contacts the clinic, the second details the exact steps a practice representative follows in DentalWriter Plus to book patient appointments, highlighting the three available entry points within the system: through the calendar, via the patient profile, through the Navigator (where scheduling an appointment is the first step of every visit flow).

Based on these workflows a number of improvement suggestions were worked out:

• review 3 points of entry for booking, prioritizing visaully one main to avoid user cognitive load and confusion;
• while communicating with patient on appointment details human factor is playing a big role when clinics representative may prioritize urgent cases, rearrange schedules, or fit in extra patients, thus ability to mark the appointment with some sort of appointment status flag would be very useful;
• canceling and rescheduling must be brought to a dentist clearly and in time, so prominent changes notification is important;
• sending online questionnaire link automatically after clicking confirm appointment button;
• tracking who booked or changed appointments is important for accountability and HIPAA compliance, that is why detailed logs visible to office managers and dentist are required.

After analyzing interviews and open-source information I have indentified a number of services dentists are using for making online appointments. A competitive analysis was done to see what useful features other services can own to use in DentalWriter Plus.

While some of these systems allowed integration into dental software, the team decided that instead of relying on multiple third-party services—each with its own specialties and potential complications—the most optimal solution was to develop an in-house appointment book tailored specifically to our needs.