Yes. Store a next visit due date on each patient's contact, and a Custom Date Reminder trigger in GoHighLevel sends reminders before and after that date, with no one tracking a list. The bottom line: name the visit correctly for each patient, because Medicare covers an annual wellness visit and not a routine physical, and the reminder should say what the patient's plan actually covers.
Annual physical or wellness visit
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services covers an annual wellness visit for a beneficiary who is no longer within 12 months of the effective date of Part B and has not had an initial preventive physical exam or an annual wellness visit in the past 12 months. Medicare pays for one first visit per beneficiary and then one subsequent visit every 12 months. The visit is not a head to toe physical exam, and a UConn Health guide notes that Medicare does not cover routine physicals after the first 12 months. Commercial plans differ. So the reminder should use the visit name the patient's payer covers, and the practice should check the plan's rules and its own scheduling policy before wording it.
Why reminders work, and HIPAA's marketing line
The Community Preventive Services Task Force recommends client reminder and recall systems for vaccination and notes they can be used for additional preventive care notices, with a median 11 percentage point increase in vaccination. On privacy, HHS says communications about a covered entity's own health related services are excluded from the marketing definition, and its FAQ says disease management, preventive care, and wellness communications are generally not marketing. That changes if a third party pays the practice to send the message. A reminder from the practice about the practice's own preventive visit is not marketing under HHS's guidance, as long as no third party remuneration is involved.
| When | Message |
|---|---|
| 30 days before the due date | Time to book your preventive visit, with a booking link |
| On the due date | Reminder, with how to book by phone |
| 30 days after | Second reminder, and a task for staff to call patients at higher risk |
| 90 days after | Last reminder, then stop |
Build it in GoHighLevel
GoHighLevel's Custom Date Reminder page says the trigger fires before, on, or after a date, that in contact based workflows you can choose supported contact date fields and supported opportunity date fields, that it does not fire for a contact whose date field is empty, and that a workflow can hold two triggers, one before and one after the date. It also describes a Match on the year option for reminders that repeat every year, so read that setting's description in your account and test it with a real date field.
- Create a date field, Next preventive visit due, and a text field, Visit type to book.
- Set the due date when a visit is completed. GoHighLevel's Math Operation action can add months to a date field, and if the date comes from your EHR, import or sync it.
- Build a workflow with the Custom Date Reminder trigger set to 30 days before the due date, and duplicate it for the other times in the table.
- Send the generic text with a booking link, and add a Stop line.
- Add an If/Else so a patient who already booked leaves the sequence.
- Add a task for the nurse on the day after the second reminder for patients with a flagged condition.
Worked example
For example, a practice with 2,000 active patients and 70 percent due in a given year has 1,400 reminders to send (2,000 times 0.7). If reminders raise visits by even 6 percentage points, in line with the median for reminder and recall used alone, that is 84 more visits (1,400 times 0.06).
Mistakes to avoid
- Calling every visit a physical. Medicare covers a wellness visit.
- Not clearing the date after the visit. The reminder follows the field.
- Accepting third party payment to send the message. That can make it marketing.
- Putting a condition in the text. Keep it generic.
How this was handled before
Practices mailed postcards or printed a recall list from the practice system and called patients when time allowed. The Community Guide evidence for reminders and recall dates from before text messaging was common. A due date field and a trigger reproduce the postcard on a schedule.
What to measure after launch
Track patients due, reminders sent, visits booked within 60 days, and opt outs. Compare booking rates by payer type and adjust the visit name.
Check before you switch it on
US text messages sent from a standard 10 digit number need A2P 10DLC registration. The HighLevel support portal says registration is required for texts to US recipients from 10 digit long code numbers and that toll free numbers do not require it. HighLevel's opt in guidelines also say a person cannot be forced to agree to text messages in order to submit a form, so keep the consent box optional. One compliance guide separates informational texts, which need documented consent, from marketing texts, which need prior express written consent. Ask your attorney which category your reminders fall into. Have your billing lead confirm visit names by payer, and your privacy officer approve the text. This is general information, not legal advice.
Questions people ask
Does Medicare cover an annual physical?
It covers an annual wellness visit once every 12 months after the first year, which is not a routine physical exam.
Is a preventive visit reminder marketing under HIPAA?
HHS says communications about the practice's own health related services are not marketing, unless a third party pays for them.
How does the reminder start?
GoHighLevel's Custom Date Reminder trigger fires before, on, or after a date field.
Ready to try it yourself? Start a GoHighLevel account here.
You can also see this in action in our GoHighLevel capabilities demo.