In 2024, 65% of U.S. adults were offered a patient portal and used it, based on federal survey data. That leaves about a third who either weren't offered one or never logged in.
For a CureMD practice, that third matters most when the practice has to start the conversation. A flu clinic, a provider leaving, an overdue checkup, a same-week opening. Each one needs a message sent to patients who haven't called, often hundreds of them in the same week.
CureMD's patient tools mostly wait for the patient. The Patient Portal responds when someone logs in.
The AI Contact Center runs 24/7 in 14 languages and handles the calls patients make. Recalls are added patient by patient under Alerts/Recalls, with options to print the report or mailing labels.
So outreach splits in two. Portal users get the message. Everyone else lands on a call sheet that staff work between check-ins. Plenty of those calls end in voicemail, and the callback comes while the desk is checking someone in.
Our view: every practice needs one outbound channel that reaches each patient with a cellphone. For most panels, that channel is text.
Broadcast texting fills that slot next to CureMD, and patients don't have to sign up for anything. It also gives the front desk a way to fill a canceled slot before noon.
CureMD stays the system of record for charts, billing, and the schedule. The broadcast just carries the message to the phone, and the replies come back to staff.
A portal-based campaign reaches the patients who already use the portal. Everyone else depends on someone at the desk with a phone.
|
CureMD channel |
Who starts it |
Who it reaches |
|---|---|---|
|
Patient Portal |
The patient logs in |
Registered portal users |
|
AI Contact Center |
The patient calls |
Anyone who dials in, 24/7, in 14 languages |
|
CureConfirm |
The practice, the day before a visit |
Patients with a booked appointment |
|
Alerts/Recalls |
Staff, one patient at a time |
Whoever staff reach from the printed report |
In CureMD's published materials, none of these sends one text to a whole group of patients at once.
The federal 2024 patient access data brief found 77% of individuals were offered online access to their records. Only 65% were offered access and used it. Apply that national rate to an illustrative panel of 4,000 patients, and about 1,400 sit outside any portal-only campaign.
Those patients still carry phones. Pew Research Center's 2026 mobile fact sheet reports 98% of U.S. adults own a cellphone, including 96% of adults 65 and older.
The recall report says "contacted," but only portal users saw the note. The rest go onto a call sheet worked between check-ins, one voicemail at a time.
A Saturday flu clinic ends with open chairs and a callback log. The patients who missed it weren't avoiding the practice. Nobody reached them on a channel they check.
A sample broadcast reads: "Flu shots are in at Maple Street Clinic. Walk in Sat 9 to 1, or reply here and we'll text you a time. Reply STOP to opt out." It names no condition and asks for one reply.
Curogram for CureMD syncs appointments through CureMD's API. It checks every 15 minutes for the next 3 days, then every 30 minutes for the 4 days after. It doesn't pull the full patient list or CureMD's recall records.
Patients with upcoming visits are already in Curogram. For a wider campaign, staff export the list from CureMD and load it into Curogram. That's how targeted patient text broadcasts by last visit date work in practice: the date filter happens in the export.
Staff pick a template for a recall, flu clinic, schedule opening, or office update, then send. Replies land in a shared inbox, where anyone on the team can answer and book the visit in CureMD.
A booked visit then syncs back into Curogram for reminders, covered in CureMD reminders that confirm by text reply. Patients who reply STOP drop out of future broadcasts automatically.
Primary care runs flu pushes and annual-visit recalls. Cardiology chases overdue follow-ups, and dermatology sends yearly skin-check reminders.
Pediatrics fills well-child slots before school starts. Each campaign uses its own list, built from the same CureMD export process.
For multilingual panels, write the message in the patient's language inside Curogram. CureMD doesn't pass a language preference through the sync, so staff set it once.
Curogram Highlight: Mass TextingMass Texting sends one HIPAA-compliant message to a list of any size and tracks delivery and responses for each patient. Messages are encrypted, and every exchange is logged for audit. That's HIPAA-compliant broadcast texting for medical practices of any size. Curogram is HIPAA compliant and SOC 2 Type II certified and signs a Business Associate Agreement. Replies flow into the same inbox staff already use for daily texting. The Mass Texting page for CureMD users lists the setup options. |
In one multi-location Curogram client, 35% of existing patients who got an SMS recall scheduled within a month.
That's Curogram client data from clinical settings, and 1,240 patients were seen from recall messages alone. A flu push follows the same pattern.
Every number in this campaign is illustrative.
A patient cancels a 2:40 PM visit first thing in the morning. Staff send a short broadcast to patients waiting for an earlier slot with that provider.
The first reply gets the time, and staff book it in CureMD before the noon rush. Without the broadcast, that slot usually goes to whoever happens to call in, or stays empty.
Track three counts per campaign: delivered, replied, and booked. Delivered shows the list is clean. Booked divided by delivered is the number to beat next month.
That's full patient panel outreach for CureMD practices: every patient on the list gets the message, portal or not. The staff steps live in our batch patient texting workflow for CureMD staff.
Patient-side examples are in practice announcements by text for CureMD patients, and replies run on two-way HIPAA-compliant texting.
CureMD runs your charts, billing, and schedule, and its portal and AI Contact Center serve patients who come to you. Broadcast texting covers the other direction: the campaigns you send to them.
Start with one number. Ask how many patients on your panel have an active portal account. The rest won't see a portal-only campaign, and most of them answer texts every day.
Book a Curogram demo and bring that count. We'll walk through a first campaign, from the CureMD export to booked replies, on your own panel numbers.