Inbox Management
The inbox is where all messages to and from your practice are shown. We recommend the following steps in order to ensure all patient communication needs are met at a reasonable pace:
Triage:
Triaging is the process of determining which patients need the most immediate attention by you (or someone else at your practice). By first marking patients as urgent, you will be able to batch your work and take care of their needs more efficiently. Flag conversations based on urgency and then filter by level in order to make sure that anything that requires immediate attention is handled before things that can wait longer.
Escalate:
Sometimes, a patient needs help that you will need to escalate to someone else. Let someone else know that you need their attention and it will show up in their inbox. If this needs urgent attention, you can also flag the conversation so that it is highlighted within their inbox.
Respond:
Finally, for messages that are relevant to you, respond to the patient by opening up each conversation and sending a reply. Work through the list in your “New” folder. Once you respond to a patient, you can either choose to “Reply & Close” or “Reply". Clicking "Reply" moves messages to your Tracking folder. Tracked messages are moved to your “Tracking” folder so that you can easily find them if you need to follow up with the patient about something.
FAQs
What's in my "New" Inbox?
What's in my "New" Inbox?
The “New” folder in the inbox system is where you will find any new, or unread, messages. Messages appear in time order starting with the most recent, but you can filter your messages to show the oldest first if you wish. To respond to a message simply click on the patient name and the message will appear on the right side of your screen.
What are my different Inbox folders?
What are my different Inbox folders?
New: New messages will appear here as they come in.
Tracking: In this folder, you will find all messages that you have responded to but not closed. For example, you send a message to a patient and you want to keep track to see if the patient responds. When you send your message, click “Reply & Track” and the message will appear in your “Tracking” folder.
Errors: In this folder, any messages that come up with an “error” will appear here. For example, if a text message was sent to a manual patient. The message will not be delivered. This creates an “error.” All messages that result in an error will be shown here for your convenience.
Closed: This folder contains all of the conversations that you have closed. You can close conversations by clicking “Reply & Close'' after you respond to a patient. Or, you can double click the check mark button to the right of a message in your inbox. (Hover your mouse over the conversation for the check mark to appear) The check mark will turn green when the conversation is closed. If you wish to re-open a message, you can go into your “Closed” folder to “uncheck” a message.
Unattended: This folder is where you will find messages from ANY patient that has not been responded to in at least 12 hours. Any team member can respond to unattended messages. The unattended messages are arranged from newest to oldest (just like your “New” messages) but you can arrange messages to see the oldest first if you wish.
How are messages in my Inbox arranged?
How are messages in my Inbox arranged?
By default, your incoming messages are listed from newest to oldest. You can change this filter so you see the oldest messages at the top of your inbox or view messages from a specific time period. To change this filter, you can use the filter tool on the top right side of your screen.
Can I filter my Inbox?
Can I filter my Inbox?
Yes! Phamily offers many smart groupings to help you search for patients and messages. Phamily will display the available groupings you can filter by below the folder name and above the conversations.
Can I send emojis?
Can I send emojis?
Yes you can send emojis! When responding to a patient, look for the smiley face icon near the bottom of the message box to open the emoji menu.
Can patients send me pictures?
Can patients send me pictures?
Yes! Patients can send you pictures from their smart device just like any other text.
Can I send my patients pictures?
Can I send my patients pictures?
Unfortunately, no. At this time, Phamily members cannot send pictures to patients; we can only receive them.
Can I opt in a patient who has previously opted out?
Can I opt in a patient who has previously opted out?
Yes! To opt a patient in who has opted out before, the patient must text "START." You can also opt a Patient back in by navigating to the Patient profile, clicking the Settings gear to the right of the Patient name > Opt-in.
Need help?
Contact our Support Team at support@phamily.com, or click the question mark in Phamily, for assistance.