Speech technologies provider Loquendo, a Telecom Italia (News - Alert) company headquartered in Turin, recently announced a new voice messaging service that makes use of their speech technologies, was developed by IVR solutions provider Biomni Voice.

 

The new service is being use by the U.K.’s National Health Service, also known as NHS, to provide automated phone reminders for patients regarding hospital appointments.

 

Company officials say the system leverages Loquendo’s (News - Alert) text to speech, or “TTS” voices to call patients seven days before an appointment to confirm date and time.

 

According to Katharine Horner, outpatients and booking manager for the NHS, the number of patients not showing up for scheduled appointments - whether missing them, or choosing not to attend - has impacted the number of patients that could have been treated and has cost the Trust over $2 million a year.

 

"On average, one in seven outpatients fails to turn up to appointments across Eastbourne, Hastings and Bexhill Hospitals,” said Horner.

 

Since the new voice solution was deployed, NHS has recognized a significant climb in attendance as well as a reduction in waiting lists.

 

"Automated interactive voice messaging provides a practical and highly effective way to generate significant improvements for our clients, in terms of customer response rates and efficient management of limited or finite people and budget resources," said Angus Gregory, CEO, at Biomni Voice Ltd.

 

For more, check out the Speech Recognition and Text to Speech channel on TMCnet