CUSTOMER STORY

Providing Flexibility and Support for Better Medical's 700+ GPs

Better Medical is using HotDoc’s patient engagement platform to streamline day-to-day operations, provide greater support across the board and “just make life easier for everybody”.

Better Medical recently partnered with HotDoc to provide their practices with a streamlined patient engagement solution.

“It's been a really collaborative approach and really seamless.”

The Better Medical group includes around 90 practices and over 700 general practitioners. Their ethos of “doctor-led and patient-focused” allows their practices to maintain control over day-to-day operations, with the extra support of a large organisation behind them.

Briar Buttfield, Head of Marketing and Communications, says that a lot of thought went into choosing HotDoc. “We’ve done the research, and we’ve partnered with what we deem to be the cream of the crop.”

Always improving with collaboration and open communication

The partnership between HotDoc and Better Medical is really a collaboration. Their good communication and a willingness to listen benefits both sides. The partnership gives Better Medical greater control over the tools they need from HotDoc. And they get ongoing, regular discussions about potential changes to the product and features. “The [HotDoc] developers were very open to feedback.”

That feedback from Better Medical helped HotDoc improve features across the board for all customers. “It’s just been nice to see [those changes] come to fruition and know that there’s going to be a really robust product at the end of it for everyone.”

This collaborative approach relies on consistent communication, and Briar says that the project team had regular check-ins to keep progress on track. “It’s very rare to get a phone call or really have much to do with [other providers], so the level of support that we get is next level.

“HotDoc was absolutely the leading provider for the functionality that we needed.”

Proactive support to keep things running smoothly

One of the important benefits of using HotDoc was that they provided support to each individual practice directly. Briar attributes it largely to HotDoc’s “ethos of self service”, with support options that guide practices in their own time. “The resources have been fantastic. There’s links and videos for pretty much anything you could think of.”

“Having one source that we can go to for that support nationally is fantastic.”

It’s a message that was echoed at each level of the organisation. From Sally Whittaker, Practice Manager at SmartClinics Walton Bridge: “Exceptional and really supportive. I got a lot of love from HotDoc!” to Chief Medical Officer, Colin Goodson: “HotDoc provided outstanding support and communication to Better Medical and its Practice Managers throughout the transition project.”

According to Briar, it also eases the burden on Better Medical’s own support team. “It’s something that I don’t really have to think too much about,” she says, “so from a support office perspective that’s ideal because HotDoc manages the process for you.”

A strong start for SmartClinics

In 2021, SmartClinics joined Better Medical, bringing 25 new practices to the group. Rolling out HotDoc across so many new clinics at once presented a challenge.

But with careful scheduling and a rock solid onboarding process, the rollout was implemented without a hitch. Briar says, “[the rollout] alleviated some of the initial concerns that some of our Practice Managers and Doctors may have had with transitioning over.”

Now with so many practices utilising HotDoc, Briar says that Better Medical’s support team can take a backseat and let HotDoc introduce staff to the platform. “The onboarding process is pretty seamless now.”

“The system itself is so intuitive. It’s really easy for them to be able to show the rest of their teams and support their teams on the ground.”

And they’ve taken the training and run with it. Sally says “Some of our clinics didn’t have online bookings at all. So then to have HotDoc implement it, that’s just opened up a whole new world for them.”

The flexibility to set their own rules

Sally was relieved to find that she could customise the way patients booked to make sure they were getting the right kind of time and care with her team. “I think in the early days a lot of practices were very worried about patients booking appointments that they shouldn’t have booked.” But she found that HotDoc gave her patients the convenience of online bookings while still giving her team the power to set their own rules. “The more I got into it and its capacity to be finely tuned per doctor, I got a lot more confidence in it.”

“The platform provides a lot of that specialisation which is really great.”

But Sally says that the greatest benefit at a practice level was the time it saved for nursing and reception staff.

Working faster, not harder

“The nurse who does our recalls has just said to me over and over how fantastic it is and [that] it’s the best thing we’ve done.“

Sally also appreciated the way it improves efficiency for patients. They had often found calls going unanswered or not returned. But recalls and reminders mean they get more responses from patients, sooner. “You can quickly check a text if you’re grabbing a cuppa, but you can’t necessarily pick up a phone while you’re sitting at your desk.“

Briar also appreciated the efficiency practices had gained. “It’s really about just the ease and efficiency that it gives to our staff.”

“That’s basically given them a whole FTE of time back to be able to do other things.”

A patient and people centred business

HotDoc enables Better Medical to use automation to support their team, without losing their personal touch. And that comes from a focus on people, from patients to Practice Managers.

Briar says, “There are so many efficiencies that can be gained at a clinic level and it’s not about cutting resources. It just means that it alleviates the pressure on our reception teams so they can focus on the people in front of them.”

Sally highlighted the need for some greater efficiency in her practice. “It’s really important particularly as we’ve gone into a space of high clinical need with Covid.”

“As practices struggle with staffing and our telephones never stop 24 hours a day, it’s a platform that tries to take the stress off us.”

Looking forward to bigger and better things

A Better Medical continues to grow, HotDoc looks forward to maintaining that same level of care and collaboration. Whether through new practices coming on board or expansion for their existing teams, HotDoc will continue to support their teams and find new ways to improve the platform.