Two kinds of message, and why the difference matters
- Transactional: about an appointment the patient already made. The confirmation, the reminder, the aftercare note, the reschedule. Expected and specific.
- Marketing: anything that asks for a new booking or a purchase. The comeback message, the event invite, the launch, the offer. This is the one that needs consent captured before it goes out.
- The test is the content, not the name of the campaign. A reminder with an upsell in it is marketing. When unsure, treat it as marketing and get the consent. Which messages fall on which side of the line for your practice is for counsel to confirm.
How to capture and record consent
- Put a plain-language checkbox on every intake form, web form, booking page and event form: separate boxes for texts and for email, unchecked by default, with wording counsel has approved.
- Record four things for each consent: the wording shown, the date and time, the phone number, and where it was captured. Store them on the patient record, not in a spreadsheet.
- When a patient texts you first, log that too, with the date and what they asked.
- Before any marketing send, filter the list to consent recorded, no opt-out, no do-not-contact flag. The filter runs every time, not once.
- Audit it quarterly: pull ten random patients from the marketing list and find their consent record. If one is missing, fix the process, not the list. Have counsel review the records and the wording on the same schedule.
Registering the number before you text at volume
A business number that sends texts at volume has to be registered with the carriers before they will deliver the traffic reliably. The registration puts the business, the use case and sample messages on file. Unregistered traffic gets filtered, and a rejected registration can hold a campaign up for weeks. The practical steps, and the reasons registrations get bounced, are in our guide on what to do when an A2P 10DLC campaign is rejected. What the registration requires of your practice specifically is for your carrier, your texting platform and counsel to confirm.
What to send, and what never to send
- Send: the treatment by name, the provider by name, two open times, one link. In the provider's voice, short.
- Send: the comeback message timed to the patient's own interval, the event invite to the segment it is timed for, the launch to the patients who asked.
- Never: a patient's diagnosis, results, medication or body in a marketing text. The clinical facts stay in the chart. What may be said about a patient's care by text is for counsel and your medical director to confirm.
- Never: a blast to the whole list, a fourth message to someone who has not replied, or a message without a way to stop.
- Never: a message that pretends to be a person. When a patient asks, the assistant says it is the practice's assistant.
Quiet hours are your policy; opt-outs take a minute
Set quiet hours as the practice's own policy and write them down. Pick a window, say nine in the morning to seven in the evening in the patient's time zone, outside which no marketing message leaves. Whether a statutory window also applies to your practice is for counsel to confirm. Opt-outs are handled the same minute: STOP, or any plain-English version of it, flags the record, halts every marketing sequence, and gets one confirmation and nothing after. The front desk should be able to opt a patient out by hand in one click. The dashboard should show opt-outs by campaign, so you learn which messages people did not want.
Which messages need consent, with example wording
| Message type | Consent needed | Example wording |
|---|---|---|
| Appointment confirmation | The patient's own booking; confirm with counsel what your records should show | Hi Jess, you are booked with Dana Thursday at 2. Reply C to confirm or R to reschedule. |
| Appointment reminder | Same as the confirmation | Jess, see you tomorrow at 2 with Dana. Park behind the building. Reply if anything changes. |
| Comeback message | Marketing consent on record | Jess, it is about twelve weeks since your last visit with Dana. She has Tuesday at 11 or Thursday at 3. Book here. Reply STOP to opt out. |
| Event invite | Marketing consent on record | Jess, Dana is hosting a tox evening on the 14th for patients who are due. Two chairs left at 6. Hold yours here. Reply STOP to opt out. |
| Review request after a visit | Confirm with counsel; treat it as marketing unless counsel says otherwise | Thanks for coming in today, Jess. If you have a minute, Dana would value a review here. |
How to audit yours in a week
- Pull every text sent last month and sort it into transactional and marketing.
- For twenty marketing messages, find the consent record for the recipient.
- Check the number's registration status with your texting platform.
- Send STOP from your own phone and time how long the sequences take to halt.
- Give the list of gaps to counsel with the form wording attached.
What to do next
NorthCore's Bring patients back solution builds the texting engine: consent captured on every form, the marketing filter run on every send, quiet hours and opt-outs enforced, and registration handled before go-live. Scoped in writing and covered by the promise on this site: results in 90 days, or we keep working until you have them.
