Patient Recall Texts for Overdue Check-Ups and Annual Visits
Turn your EHR's recall report into a text campaign, keep clinical details behind a secure link, and set a pace your front desk can answer.
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The short answer
A patient recall text tells a patient they're due for routine care, such as an annual physical, a six-month hygiene visit or a seasonal vaccine clinic, and asks them to book. Export the recall or overdue report from your EHR as a CSV, upload it to one broadcast, and use a column like {{due_for}} only in a Secure text with link, since the reason for a visit is PHI. Set a slower "Time between messages" so replies reach your front desk at a pace they can answer. Each reply comes back as a private conversation in the team inbox.
Why recall lists go stale
Every practice has a recall list. It's the report of patients due for a check-up, a cleaning, an annual wellness visit or a follow-up who haven't booked. The list grows every week, and working it by phone is the job that gets pushed when the front desk is busy.
Recall is different from reactivation. A recall patient is still active and simply due. A reactivation patient has drifted away. The wording, the consent question and the follow-up are different, so treat them as two campaigns.
What practices usually try
Phone calls and postcards work slowly and cost staff time. Many EHRs can send automated recall messages, but most are one-way, so a patient who replies "Can I come Friday?" gets no answer. See why EHR reminders are one-way for more on that gap.
Sending the whole list from a personal phone or a basic bulk-text tool creates a different problem. Three hundred texts go out, eighty replies come back in the next twenty minutes, and the front desk can't answer them while also checking patients in.
What the visit reason does to the message
"You're due for your annual check-up" is fine in a regular text. "You're due for your diabetes follow-up" is not, because it ties a person to a condition. That's protected health information. Keep Insecure recall texts generic, and send anything that names a reason, a test or a provider as a Secure text with link.
Recall texts from a HIPAA covered entity about the patient's own care are usually health care messages. The FCC's TCPA rule exempts "health care" messages from covered entities from its written-consent requirement for promotional texts (47 CFR 64.1200(a)(2)). You still need the patient's consent to be texted at all (FCC Order DA 26-12, para. 2), and a discount or upsell moves a recall toward marketing. If it has an offer, follow the reactivation consent rules.
Build the recall list from your EHR export
Run your EHR or PM system's recall or overdue report for one recall type at a time, for example annual physicals due this month. Export it as a CSV with first name, mobile phone and MRN. Add the columns you want in the message, such as {{due_for}}, {{provider}} or {{location}}.
One broadcast per recall type keeps the message specific. A dental office might run hygiene recall and overdue X-ray recall as two broadcasts. A primary care clinic might run annual physicals and a flu clinic separately. Any column can become a variable, and a fallback such as {{due_for | check-up}} covers blank cells.
Dental practices have their own recall habits and EHRs. See HIPAA texting for dental practices for the dental workflow, and add recipients for CSV mapping.
Pace replies for the front desk
A recall text works when someone answers the replies. Set "Time between messages" so they arrive at a rate your staff can handle. As fast as possible is about 60 messages a minute. One message every 30 seconds sends 2 a minute, so 300 patients take about two and a half hours.
Schedule the send for a quiet stretch, such as 10am on a Tuesday, in the patient's time zone. Keep recall sends between 9am and 8pm. If the desk gets swamped, pause the campaign. Unsent messages go back to Not scheduled, and you resume when the desk catches up.
Replies arrive as private one-to-one conversations in your team inbox. Assign one person to work recall replies during the send window, and book from the conversation.
How to send it in BloomText
Open Broadcast in the web app sidebar and create a broadcast. In Details, choose Insecure text for a generic "you're due" note, or Secure text with link when the message names a reason, a test or a provider. See create a broadcast.
In Recipients, upload the recall CSV and map its columns. In Message, add variables and preview a few patients. Then send now or schedule it, and pick a Time between messages. See send and track.
Broadcasts need the Patient SMS Add-on and membership in a team with an assigned phone number, and BloomText verifies new accounts before their first broadcast. Patients who replied STOP earlier are on your organization's undeliverable list, so they aren't texted. A STOP typed inside a Secure text thread arrives as an ordinary reply, so mark that patient opted out from their page in Directory.
Sample patient recall texts
Insecure samples stay generic. Samples that name a reason or a visit type go as a Secure text with link. None of these carries an offer. Add one and it becomes promotional.
Annual check-up due
Insecure text: can't contain PHI
Hygiene recall
Secure text with link: can contain PHI
Names a dental service, so it goes as a Secure text with link.
Overdue follow-up with a reason
Secure text with link: can contain PHI
{{due_for}} and {{due_month}} come from the EHR recall report.
Seasonal vaccine clinic
Secure text with link: can contain PHI
Promotes the visit, with no price or offer.
Second recall reminder
Insecure text: can't contain PHI
Frequently Asked Questions
- A text telling an active patient they're due for routine care, such as an annual physical, a hygiene visit or a vaccine, and asking them to book. It differs from a reactivation text, which goes to patients who stopped coming in.
- A generic visit like an annual check-up is fine in an Insecure text. A reason that names a condition, test or treatment is PHI, so send it as a Secure text with link, which can contain PHI.
- Set a slower Time between messages. At one message every 30 seconds, 300 patients take about two and a half hours, so replies trickle in. Schedule the send for a quiet stretch, and pause the campaign if the desk falls behind.
- Usually not, when they come from a covered entity about the patient's own care, because the FCC rule exempts health care messages from its written-consent requirement. You still need the patient's consent to be texted. If you add an offer or discount, treat the text as promotional and get written consent.
- You can, with a {{due_for}} column in a Secure text with link. Separate broadcasts per recall type are usually clearer, because each can have its own wording, timing and follow-up.
- No. A person starts each broadcast, either right away or on a schedule they set. BloomText does not save lists or trigger sends from your EHR, so each month you export the new recall report and send it as a new broadcast.
What is a patient recall text?
Can a recall text say what the patient is due for?
How do we stop recall replies from overwhelming the front desk?
Do recall texts need written consent?
Can we send different recall types in one broadcast?
Can BloomText send recall texts automatically each month?
Sources
Last verified October 15, 2026.
