Palo Pinto General Hospital serves Palo Pinto County and surrounding areas in North Texas. The combined service areas cover roughly 10,000 square miles – larger than the state of Vermont. Challenged with reaching residents across such a vast region, hospital leaders recognized the growing influence of online reviews on patient trust. However, traditional methods of communication, like phone calls and mailings, relied on patients to search for the healthcare organization on Google to share their feedback. PPGH found that these traditional methods weren’t getting sufficient responses.
The rural healthcare system turned to Expanse Patient Connect to improve patient engagement and outreach in its community. Within six months of implementation, PPGH experienced a remarkable increase in the volume of Google reviews it received and a noticeable decrease in no-show rates – all from using Expanse Patient Connect’s automated and secure texting capabilities.
Increasing Google reviews and ratings
The organization implemented Expanse Patient Connect in late December 2024 and used its robust texting features to streamline post-visit communication by automatically sending personalized messages to patients 24 hours after their appointments. These messages thank patients for their visit and include a direct link to the Google Review page. Thoughtful and tailored, these messages encourage reviews, enabling PPGH to collect valuable patient feedback.
“We were looking for a way to send text messages to patients, and our IT team knew Expanse had that capability,” said Marketing Director Megan Hudson at PPGH. “Since our clinics wanted to use Expanse for appointment reminders, we decided to also use it for collecting patient feedback in the form of Google reviews. It made sense to use Expanse instead of adding another software or vendor. In the first month alone, we saw a huge increase in reviews.”
In addition to the substantial increase in the number of Google reviews PPGH received, the health system has seen a significant improvement in ratings, rising from 4.3 stars in December 2024 to 4.6 stars today.
Reducing no-shows
Expanse Patient Connect has also helped PPGH achieve measurable improvement in its no-show rates. Since January, no-shows have decreased nearly 20% – from 8.3% to 6.6%. The organization found that texting appointment reminders is more effective than phone calls, leading to more timely confirmations from patients. Anyone unable to keep an appointment can easily cancel ahead of time via text, allowing the clinic to fill that empty slot.
“We love seeing this reduction in no-shows,” said Hudson. “Reducing potential lost revenue is just another added benefit of using Expanse Patient Connect.”
Satisfying requirements and increasing transparency
Patients often attribute skipped appointments to financial barriers, such as a lack of insurance coverage or high deductibles. Since hospitals are required to provide good-faith estimates to patients before their scheduled appointments, PPGH built a quick-response message in Expanse Patient Connect so staff can enter the estimate to send to the patient. Securely texting the information saves resources while satisfying the federal requirement.
Encouraging patients to be active participants in their care is part of PPGH’s mission to promote “optimal health and well-being of the entire community.” Secure and convenient patient communication is paramount for outreach success, particularly in rural areas. Expanse Patient Connect acts as PPGH’s digital “friendly reminder,” helping to keep patients on track.