After-Hours Call Center for the Healthcare Industry

Healthcare support does not stop when your office closes. Patients, healthcare professionals, laboratories, pharmaceutical companies, or pharmacies may still need assistance after work hours.

31West provides after-hours call center support for healthcare organizations, helping handle calls, messages, and support requests outside regular working hours. Our trained teams can follow your defined processes, handle routine requests, document information, perform specified triage tasks and escalate critical matters to the appropriate team.

Our healthcare support can be customized based on your organization’s requirements, including the type of calls handled, escalation procedures, information that needs to be collected and the systems your team uses.

For general practitioners and small to medium-sized clinics, calls and patient requests can continue long after the practice closes.

31West can provide after-hours support to help your team manage incoming calls and requests, book, cancel or reschedule appointment, collect relevant information and ensure that important matters are directed according to your established procedures.

Our trained teams can work with your existing CRM or patient information systems where required, reducing the need for your staff to manually transfer information between systems.

Where applicable, specific triage tasks can also be performed according to your instructions and defined protocols. The scope of triage is defined by your healthcare organization and may include information gathering, categorization and routing according to your workflows. Matters that fall outside the team’s agreed scope can be escalated to the appropriate healthcare professional or on-call team.

Medical laboratories, pharmacies and specialist practices deal with time-sensitive calls and requests from patients, doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals.

An after-hours support team can help ensure that these requests are not simply left waiting for the next business day.

31West can receive or make calls, resolve issues, gather the required information, document requests, and direct them to the appropriate person or team.

For organizations handling time-sensitive requests, clearly defined escalation procedures can help ensure that matters requiring attention are routed appropriately after regular business hours.

Hospitals operate around the clock, but not every department, administrative function, or support team is staffed at the same level throughout the day and night.

31West can support hospitals and healthcare facilities by handling defined after-hours calls and routine requests, allowing internal clinical and operational teams to focus on matters that require their direct attention.

Depending on your requirements, our team can:

• Answer incoming after-hours calls
• Collect and document information
• Handle defined routine requests
• Provide information according to approved procedures
• Perform specified triage tasks
• Route requests to the appropriate team
• Escalate critical matters according to your escalation process
• Support patient outreach activities where required

The scope of support can be defined around your business priorities, ensuring that the team knows what it can handle directly and when a matter needs to be escalated.

Pharmacies and pharmaceutical companies may receive calls from patients, healthcare professionals, and other stakeholders outside regular business hours.

Maintaining an internal team solely for overnight and weekend coverage can be difficult when call volumes are low or vary based on day of week or holidays.

31West can provide after-hours support to help pharmacies and pharmaceutical companies handle defined incoming requests, collect information, document interactions, and route matters according to your custom SOPs.

The service can be configured around your requirements so that routine requests are handled by our trained support team, while matters requiring additional attention are directed to the appropriate internal or on-call team.

The process can be structured around your existing workflows and escalation processes.

1. A patient, healthcare professional or other caller contacts your organization
   Calls and other agreed support requests are received by 31West’s after-hours team.
2. 31West’s trained team follows your defined process
   Our agents use your approved information, procedures and workflows to understand and handle the request.
3. Routine requests are handled within the agreed scope
   The team can answer defined questions, collect information, document requests, and perform other agreed support tasks.
4. Specified triage tasks are performed where required
   Where 31West is instructed to do so, the team can perform defined triage tasks according to your procedures and specifications.
5. Critical or out-of-scope matters are escalated
   Issues requiring a healthcare professional, on-call team, or other designated resource are escalated according to the agreed escalation process.
6. Information is documented for follow-up
   Relevant information can be recorded in the agreed system or workflow so that the appropriate team has the necessary context.

What is an after-hours healthcare call center?

An after-hours healthcare call center provides support to healthcare organizations outside their regular operating hours. Depending on the agreed service, the team can answer calls, support users, collect information, handle defined requests, document interactions, perform specified triage tasks and escalate matters to the appropriate team.

Who can use after-hours healthcare call center support?

After-hours support can be used by GP practices, clinics, medical specialists, laboratories, hospitals, healthcare facilities, pharmacies and pharmaceutical companies that need support outside their regular operating hours.

What can an after-hours healthcare call center handle?

The scope depends on the organisation’s requirements. Services can include answering calls, collecting information, handling defined routine requests, documenting interactions, performing specified triage tasks and escalating matters according to established procedures.

Can 31West perform triage for healthcare organisations?

Yes. 31West’s trained teams can perform certain triage tasks according to the client’s specifications and established procedures. The exact scope of triage should be defined during service setup.

How are urgent healthcare calls handled after hours?

Urgent matters can be handled according to the healthcare organisation’s established escalation procedure. The team can collect relevant information, document the request and escalate it to the designated healthcare professional, on-call team or other appropriate resource.

Can 31West work with our existing healthcare systems?

Yes. 31West can work with a client’s existing CRM, patient information system or other business applications where required. The specific systems and workflows can be defined as part of the service setup.

Can small clinics use after-hours healthcare support?

Yes. After-hours support is reasonably priced making is affordable for smaller healthcare organizations that need coverage outside their normal operating hours without maintaining the same level of internal staffing throughout the day and night.

Can after-hours healthcare support include weekends and holidays?

Coverage can be customised according to the organisation’s requirements, including after-hours, weekend and holiday support.

Is after-hours healthcare support only for hospitals?

No. After-hours support can also be used by GP practices, clinics, medical specialists, laboratories and pharmaceutical companies, depending on their support requirements.