“Zoe takes calls from your patients and answers their questions without you having to intervene. » This is the promise of Bonjour-santé, which now offers an intelligent telephone assistant to medical clinics. But the reality is quite different: patients instead come up against “a wall” and say they are unable to make themselves understood.
What there is to know
- The Zoé intelligent telephone assistant from Bonjour-santé gives many headaches to patients who say they are unable to make themselves understood.
- So far, nine clinics in the province are using the smart phone assistant.
- According to Bonjour-santé, Zoé provides time savings of 84% for clinics.
Last December, Olivia Scallon tried to make an appointment at the Angus medical clinic in Montreal for her 3-year-old son. “I have tried their website several times without success. »
So she called the clinic, where she was put in contact with Zoé, the intelligent telephone assistant. “Zoe didn’t understand anything I said. She wanted to transfer me to a pharmacist, so I hung up,” says Mme Scallon.
Since she works in the field of artificial intelligence, she assumed that there were keywords that would direct patients to someone directly. “I called back and said, “EMERGENCY, EMERGENCY.” As it happened, it transferred me to the receptionist,” she recalls.
In a context where it is already difficult to obtain a medical appointment, she deplores that Zoé only accentuates the problem. “When the process for making an appointment doesn’t work, it’s frustrating. »
A service established in nine clinics
The Angus Clinic is one of nine medical clinics in the province using the intelligent patient telephone assistant named Zoé. This service, offered by the software development company Bonjour-santé, has been gradually deployed since December 2022 in the Montreal and Quebec regions.
Zoé’s goal is to take patient calls and answer their questions without clinic staff having to intervene. According to Bonjour-santé, Zoé provides time savings of 84% for clinics. More than 60% of calls would be handled without the intervention of an employee.
” Most [des cliniques] have staffing issues and the adoption of automated services is an avenue that allows us to gain volume capacity and ultimately respond to the patient who, not so long ago, could be waiting for long minutes on the phone or had to call back several times,” he told The Press Annie Blanchette, from Tootelo, who heads Bonjour-santé.
“A horrible experience”
Many patients report their bad experience with Zoé via Google reviews of the Angus medical clinic.
“Your virtual system Zoe is completely inadequate and she understands absolutely nothing. »
“Telephone access has always been difficult. But the new robot which claims to allow appointments to be made is catastrophic. »
Impossible to communicate important information! The robot is useless, it’s a horrible experience!
Excerpt from a Google review of Angus Medical Clinic
Same story with the Sillery medical clinic in Quebec. “Zoe system: rotten. If she is in training, it will be years before she graduates,” one patient wrote in a Google review.
In response to comments, Angus Medical Clinic claims that it receives more than 1,000 calls every day, “which means that [les patients risquent] being put on hold for long minutes or [doivent] Call back later “.
The clinic says it has adopted the Zoé service to ensure that all calls can be answered, specifying that the telephone assistant is “constantly evolving”. “We thank you for being patient and using short, clear sentences when speaking to Zoé,” the clinic suggests to patients.
“It makes us go in circles”
“This robot is a wall. It makes us go in circles. It may save time and money for the clinic, but absolutely not for the patients. It makes you lose patience,” said The Press Anaïs, who preferred to keep her last name quiet for fear of no longer being taken care of. She made a complaint to the Angus Medical Clinic after having two bad experiences with the telephone assistant.
Last summer, she tried to contact the clinic to find out if her appointment was in person or over the phone, as was the case during the pandemic. “Normally, I get called to confirm, but I didn’t get a call. 30 minutes before the appointment, I still didn’t know if I should go to the clinic or not. »
No option offered by the telephone assistant allowed her to respond to her request. “With the Zoé robot, it’s absolutely impossible to talk to anyone. It would have taken me 20 seconds to get an answer to my question. »
In the following weeks, she contacted the clinic about her feverish daughter. Zoé informed her that her request had been taken into account and that she would be called back within 48 hours. “But 48 hours of fever for an infant, you go to the emergency room,” said the mother.
She finally decided to go to the clinic in person to get an appointment. On site, she was told that she absolutely had to go through the telephone system to obtain one. After filing a complaint at the clinic, she took steps to obtain an appointment for her daughter at another establishment.