Fertility Consent is designed so that all the education and form filling activities can be done by patients / partners at home. This makes it more convenient for them, giving them time to go through all the legal and medical information.
When they do visit the clinic for the first time it means the time spent with clinic staff can focus on any questions and concerns they may have before signing their consent forms.
The goal should be that all consent materials and forms are completed 24 hours before their appointment to keep timings on schedule. Individual clinic SOPs will vary, so below is a best practice model to plan from.
Managing the 'Red Zone'
The Red Zone on the Fertility Consent calendar defines a period (normally 7 days) from today's date, showing all the forthcoming appointments in this period along with their status.
Each day a member of the patient service team should review the Red Zone and identify the following actions:
- Appointments due in the next 7 days where the case status is as New, i.e. neither the patient or partner (if there is one) has logged in and started the consent process.
- Action: send message (e.g. email or portal) to remind them to complete the forms 48 hours before their appointment
- Appointments due in the next 5 days where the case status is as New
- Action: send a message (e.g. SMS) telling them to complete the forms 48 hours before their appointment
- Appointments due in the next 2 days - there are to two tasks here.
- If the case status is still showing as New (despite the above reminders) then the patient should be contacted directly.
- Action: call the patient to check whether they are having any difficulties completing the forms, if they have any queries, and remind them that they must complete the forms before their appointment. Optionally - advise them that their appointment may need to be rescheduled if the forms have not been completed.
- If the case status is showing as In Progress a quick check needs to be made to ensure the forms have been completed (this is because some clinics allow some forms to be signed at home, while others prefer all forms to be signed in clinic.
- Action: review the case summary and only call the patient if the required forms have not been completed
- If the case status is still showing as New (despite the above reminders) then the patient should be contacted directly.
- NB If there is a genuine reason why the patient / partner cannot complete their forms ahead of their appointment, advise the patient that they must attend the clinic 45 minutes ahead of their appointment time to watch the information videos and complete the forms in clinic.