FeaturesProduct capabilityLimits apply
WhatsApp appointment reminders: only to patients who agreed, and only once a dispatcher runs
DrOnlineIQ can send a patient a WhatsApp reminder before a visit, through the clinic's own WhatsApp Business connection. Each visit gets a reminder in a queue, a reminder goes only to a patient whose consent is recorded, and everything is checked again just before sending. Nothing runs by itself: the clinic's deployment must call the dispatcher on a schedule, and no real message has yet been sent through the provider, so the owner should send the first one to their own number.
Create a free 14-day trial account with demonstration data, or ask for a demo. Do not enter real patient data during the trial.
Who it serves and what it solves
A desk that phones patients one by one
Once the setup is done, the reminder is queued from the visit itself, so nobody has to remember to send it. It carries the patient's name, the clinic and the time only.
An owner who does not want to message people who never agreed
A patient with no recorded consent gets no reminder, unless the clinic switches on its own rule. Someone who asked to stop gets nothing whatever that setting says.
A patient who moves or cancels a visit
When reception moves or cancels the visit, the queue follows: the waiting reminder is cancelled and one is queued for the new time, once.
An owner who wants to know whether it is working
The reminders settings page shows how many messages are in each status and when the dispatcher last ran, and warns when no dispatcher has run in the last 3 hours.
A realistic day
The owner prepares the base
Connects the clinic's WhatsApp Business account, gets WhatsApp's approval for the reminder message template, and agrees with whoever runs the clinic's deployment on a schedule that calls the dispatcher. Then switches reminders on and chooses one or two times before the visit.
Reception records the patient's consent
On the patient's file, reception records what the patient said, in words or in writing: agreed to reminders, or wants no messages. The entry is kept with the staff member's name and the date and is never erased.
A visit is booked
For each upcoming visit, a reminder is queued for every time the clinic chose, for example 24 hours before. The same reminder is never queued twice.
The dispatcher runs
Each time it is called, the dispatcher takes the messages whose time has come and checks each one again: the visit still stands, the consent still holds, reminders are switched on. Nothing is sent between 21:00 and 08:00 on the clinic's clock.
A patient phones to change the time
Reception moves the visit. The waiting reminder is cancelled and one is queued for the new time. A message telling the patient about the change goes only if the clinic switched that on.
Delivery receipts and the patient's reply
When WhatsApp reports that a message arrived or was read, its status in the queue is updated. If the patient replies with a stop word such as STOP, it is recorded that they want no messages, and if they write START the record is reversed.
The owner checks the page
Sees how many messages are waiting, how many were sent, how many failed or were skipped and why, and when the dispatcher last ran.
Who does what
- Reception
- Records a patient's consent or refusal on the file, sees and adjusts the reminders settings page, and moves or cancels visits, with the queue following.
- Practitioner
- Sees on the patient's file whether the patient agreed to reminders, and cannot change it.
- Owner
- Connects WhatsApp Business, gets the templates, arranges the schedule that calls the dispatcher, and sets the times, the rule for older numbers and the change notices.
What the product does today
Consent per patient: agreed, asked to stop, or no answer recorded. A patient with no answer gets no reminder unless the clinic switches on Treat existing phone numbers as consent, which is off at first. Someone who asked to stop gets nothing in either case. Entries are added, never edited.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
Registering patients and remindersA message queue: one row for each visit and reminder time, so a reminder cannot be queued twice. If two dispatchers run at the same moment, each message is taken by only one of them, so it is not sent twice.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
When it goes: one or two times from 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12, 24, 48 and 72 hours before the visit, with 24 as the default. Nothing is sent between 21:00 and 08:00 on the clinic's clock: it moves to 08:00 if at least 15 minutes remain before the visit, otherwise to 20:00 the evening before. A reminder that is more than half the lead time late is not sent.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
The text carries the patient's name, the clinic and the time only: no medical information, no link and no reason for the visit, online visits included.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
Cancelling or moving a visit from reception makes the queue follow at once. If the visit is changed from the patient portal or the WhatsApp assistant, the last check before sending catches it, so no reminder goes for a cancelled visit.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
On failure it tries again after 5 minutes and then after 30 minutes, and the third failure ends it. A final answer from the provider, such as a number that has no WhatsApp, ends it at once. A failed message is written to the clinic's message history with the reason.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
WhatsApp's delivery receipts update the message's status in the queue. A status moves forward and never back.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
A Reminder and dispatcher settings page for the owner and reception: on and off, the times, the rule for older numbers, change notices, the count of patients by consent, the count of messages by status, and the last run. The message No dispatcher has run in the last 3 hours — reminders are not being sent shows when nobody has run it.Limits apply
It needs a WhatsApp Business connection and a scheduler that runs the sending; no real reminder has been sent through the provider yet.
The settings page, option by option
Only the owner and reception see it.
- Switching reminders on: if it is off nothing goes out, including the messages already waiting
- When the reminder goes: one or two times before the visit
- Treat existing phone numbers as consent: off at first, the clinic is responsible for it being right, and it never covers someone who asked to stop
- Tell the patient when a visit is cancelled or moved: off at first, and it needs two templates approved by WhatsApp
- Patient consent: agreed, asked to stop, no answer recorded
- Message queue: waiting, sending, sent, failed and will retry, failed for good, skipped, cancelled
- The dispatcher: the time of the last run, and a warning if 3 hours pass without one
Setting up and moving over
What you need before it works
- The clinic's own WhatsApp Business account and message templates approved by Meta.
- A scheduler that calls the sender regularly (a scheduled job the owner switches on). Without it no message is sent.
- Connect the clinic's own WhatsApp Business account and ask WhatsApp to approve the reminder message template (and the cancelled and rescheduled templates if you want change notices). The reminder goes out on the clinic's own number and credentials, not a shared one.
- Arrange with whoever runs the clinic's deployment for the dispatcher to be called on a schedule: an hourly job on a platform plan that allows it, a ready GitHub Actions workflow that stays off until the owner switches it on and then runs every 15 minutes, or any outside scheduling service that calls the address every 5 to 15 minutes. A reminder goes at the first run after its time comes, so the precision of the timing is the precision of the schedule. The launch runbook explains the three options.
- Try the first message yourself before you rely on the service: create a patient file with your own number that has WhatsApp, record your consent, book a visit that is further away than the reminder time you chose, and wait for the message to arrive.
- Record each patient's consent from the patient's file. The online booking form does not ask about WhatsApp consent and does not record any. Switching on the rule for older numbers is the clinic's decision and responsibility.
- A patient needs a WhatsApp number on file. Nothing is imported from a paper notebook or an Excel file for this; the numbers are entered in the patient files.
Limits worth knowing
- Nothing runs by itself: no reminder goes out until a schedule in the clinic's deployment calls the dispatcher, and that is something the owner switches on. If no dispatcher runs, the page warns you after 3 hours.
- It needs the clinic's own WhatsApp Business account and message templates approved by WhatsApp. Without them no messages go out.
- No real message has been sent through the provider yet, and no real delivery receipt has come back. Everything was run against a stand-in sender. So send the first one to your own number before you rely on the service.
- Paid messages are billed by the provider and are not in the plan price.
- No delivery time is promised: a reminder goes at the first run of the dispatcher after its time comes. A reminder more than half the lead time late (12 hours at most) is skipped rather than sent at a bad moment. A visit booked after its reminder time has passed gets no reminder, because the patient has just been told.
- In a rare case, if the dispatcher stops abruptly after the provider accepted a message and before the product recorded it, the same message can be sent a second time about 10 minutes later.
- The public booking form records no consent, so patients who book online need their consent recorded by reception.
- No SMS is sent, and the quiet hours (21:00 to 08:00) and the grace period are the same for every clinic.
Questions
Will every patient get a reminder when I switch it on?
No. Only those whose consent is recorded. A patient with no recorded answer gets nothing unless the clinic switches on the rule for older numbers, which is off at first. Someone who asked to stop gets nothing whatever the setting.
Does it run by itself?
No, not until a schedule in your clinic's deployment calls the reminders dispatcher. The owner switches that on in one of the three ways in the launch runbook. Until then no reminder goes out, and the page warns you after 3 hours without a run.
What does the message say?
The patient's name, the clinic's name and the time of the visit. No medical information, no link and no reason for the visit, and it arrives as a message template that WhatsApp has approved.
Has sending actually been tried with WhatsApp?
No. No real message has yet been sent through the provider, and the product has been run against a stand-in sender. So try it on your own number before you rely on it with patients.
Who pays for the messages?
The clinic, through its account with the provider. Paid messages are billed by the provider and are not in the plan price.
Is the patient told when a visit is cancelled or moved?
Only if the clinic switched this option on and both templates are approved in its account. Otherwise no message goes, and the queue records the case as Skipped. The waiting reminder for the old visit is always cancelled.
What if the patient replies STOP?
It is recorded that they want no messages, and no reminder goes to them after that. If they later write START, their consent is recorded again.
What happens if sending fails?
It tries again after 5 minutes and then after 30 minutes. After the third failure it ends, and the message is written to the clinic's message history with the reason. If the provider answers that the number has no WhatsApp, it is not tried again.
Price
Plans are annual. Prices are read from the same list that checkout uses.
Essential
499,000 IQD
/ year
Professional
699,000 IQD
/ year
Business
1,200,000 IQD
/ year
Enterprise
By agreement
How-to guides
Try it in your own practice
Create a free 14-day trial account with demonstration data, or ask for a demo. Do not enter real patient data during the trial.
Content last updated: 2026-10-24