Automated Virtual Assistant Transforms Patient Booking and Clinic Utilisation

Revolutionising the Outpatient Booking process at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust with our Clinic Utilisation solution.

The Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust

The challenge

Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust is one of the largest and busiest acute hospital trusts in the country, providing specialist services for communities across the Yorkshire and Humber regions. The Outpatient appointment booking at Leeds faced significant operational challenges, particularly for time-critical pathways like the breast two-week wait referrals. The traditional manual calling process was labour-intensive and often caused staff to spend time chasing patients through multiple unanswered calls. This led to appointment delays, duplicated administrative work, missed opportunities to offer patients genuine choice in their appointment times and reduced clinic utilisation rates.

Frontline staff were under pressure, caught in cycles of repeated calling attempts and voicemail management, instead of engaging in productive patient conversations. Timing is critical in urgent pathways, so these inefficiencies were more than operational challenges – the impact on patient outcome and experience was enormous.

Deploying an automated virtual assistant

Working in close collaboration with Netcall, Leeds enrolled in a pilot programme supported by NHS England to implement an automated solution which was tailored specifically to their operational requirements.  Our Clinic Utilisation solution centres around a customisable Automated Virtual Assistant.

“Clinic Utilisation has turned the old way of booking clinic appointments on its head. What used to take hours of chasing and manual effort is now a lean, automated process helping teams work smarter, not harder. And crucially, it makes it easier for patients to be seen sooner.”

Rob Child

Programme Manager, Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust

The solution

“The transformation achieved with our Clinic Utilisation solution has exceeded expectations. The combination of improved patient experience, enhanced operational efficiency and increased staff satisfaction creates a compelling case for wider adoption of automated booking solutions.”

Rob Child

Programme Manager, Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust

The result

  1. 65% reduction in booking time and administration
  2. Patient choice booking rates increased from 78% to 95% – In the breast 2WW pathway
  3. Enhanced patient satisfaction – Improved appointment availability and convenience
  4. Reduced DNA rate – Due to proactive patient engagement
  5. Operational efficiency – Booking tasks that previously took a day and a half, now completed in a single morning
  6. Staff achieve 100% productive time – During booking activities and no more time spent leaving voicemails and chasing unresponsive patients
  7. Staff experience – Significant improvement in team morale and engagement due to reduced administrative burden and increased focus on meaningful patient interactions
  8. Scalability – Rapid expansion from initial Breast 2WW implementation to four specialties and imminent rollout to Diabetes, ENT, Ophthalmology and Orthopaedics departments as part of a formal implementation across all centralised booking services.
Helping teams work smarter, not harder

Leeds have shown the potential for this approach across the whole NHS, providing a blueprint for other Trusts facing similar Outpatient Booking challenges. As Leeds continues to expand the Automated Virtual Assistant system across additional specialties, they are building valuable insights into how AI-powered patient communication can transform healthcare delivery while maintaining the human touch that patients value.

Impact

35.7% Improved Patient Choice Booking Rate

patients can now secure appointment times that work for their schedules

100% Staff Productivity

staff only deal with successful calls, connecting with patients that wish to book appointments

Scalable Operational Change

from one to four specialties with plans for Trust-wide implementation – a blueprint for transforming outpatient booking across the entire trust

Maximise capacity without adding extra clinics

Here’s how you can automate patient outreach, simplify the task of filling available clinic slots and ensure maximum efficiency.

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