Customer: Danielle Buckley, Practice Administrator, Care for Women
Interviewed by: Kathy Douglas, RN, MPH-HA
Industry: Women’s Health
When Danielle Buckley, Practice Administrator at Care for Women, joined the organization, she saw an opportunity to modernize the way the practice operated. Like many established healthcare organizations, Care for Women had processes that had worked for years but were increasingly inefficient. One of the most time-consuming was new patient intake.
Before each appointment, the scheduling team reviewed upcoming schedules, printed new patient packets, prepared envelopes, addressed them, and mailed paperwork to patients. When the forms were returned, staff had to scan or file them in patient charts. And when patients arrived without completing their paperwork, the process started again. The result was unnecessary administrative work, additional costs, and delays that could affect the entire appointment schedule.
Danielle knew there had to be a better way. Having worked in other healthcare environments, she had seen how technology could simplify routine processes. When a friend and fellow business owner recommended Lobbie, she was interested in exploring what they could do for Care for Women. The opportunity was straightforward: eliminate unnecessary paper, simplify the work of the scheduling team, and make the experience easier for patients.
Care for Women implemented Lobbie's digital intake solution to streamline the new patient experience, eliminating cumbersome paper processes and making it easier for patients to complete the right paperwork before arriving for their appointments.
Today, when a new patient schedules an appointment, the scheduling team selects the appropriate digital form packet and sends it directly to the patient's phone. Different appointment types have different requirements. For example, a new gynecology patient receives the forms appropriate to that visit, while a new obstetrics patient receives a different packet.
Patients can complete their paperwork wherever and whenever it is convenient, without waiting for forms to arrive in the mail or sitting in the waiting room with a clipboard. For the staff, the change eliminated multiple steps that had previously been part of every new patient appointment.
As Danielle explains: "Being able to text the patient with the forms and have them complete it before they come in ... it's really been a game changer." The practice also uses Lobbie to send consent forms before certain procedures and tests, extending the benefits of digital paperwork beyond initial registration.
One of the most significant benefits has been the reduction in repetitive administrative work. Previously, preparing and processing paperwork involved printing, assembling packets, mailing, checking for completed forms, scanning documents, and managing paperwork at check-in.
With Lobbie, much of that manual preparation has been eliminated. The scheduling team can see whether patients have completed their forms before arriving and send follow-up messages when information is missing. This visibility helps the team address outstanding paperwork in advance rather than discovering it when the patient checks in.
With automation the team no longer spends time to print, assemble, mail, scan, and process paperwork. Danielle estimates that the change saves approximately 15 to 20 minutes per new patient, depending on the appointment type and paperwork required. Although this is a practice-level estimate rather than a formal time study, it illustrates the meaningful operational difference the team has experienced.
Just as importantly, the time saved creates capacity for more valuable work. Danielle describes how the reduction in paperwork has allowed staff to spend more time assisting patients, answering calls, scheduling appointments, and managing their daily responsibilities. Instead of spending their time preparing envelopes and processing paper, employees have more opportunities to support patient engagement.
The benefits extend beyond scheduling. When patients complete their paperwork before arriving, check-in becomes easier, and the clinical team is less likely to experience delays caused by patients filling out forms in the waiting room. For physicians, this means fewer interruptions to the appointment schedule. For patients, it means greater convenience and less time devoted to administrative tasks during their visit.
Danielle notes that patients have responded positively to the digital process. The ability to complete forms on a phone is particularly valuable because patients can work through their paperwork at their convenience and return to it when needed. Rather than keeping track of a paper packet, they have access to their forms wherever they are.
There are still occasional incomplete submissions, such as a missed signature, which can trigger additional reminders. But the practice can identify these situations and follow up before the appointment. The overall result is a more organized process from scheduling through check-in and the clinical visit.
Introducing new technology is an opportunity to simplify everyday operations and make work easier for staff. At Care for Women, the team quickly recognized how much easier Lobbie's digital intake solution made their daily responsibilities. By eliminating time-consuming paperwork and streamlining routine tasks, staff experienced a more efficient, manageable workflow that freed up valuable time to focus on patients.
Another important part of the experience has been Lobbie's responsiveness. As the practice developed its digital forms and appointment-specific packets, the Lobbie team helped configure and refine them. Danielle appreciates that when the practice requests updates, the support team responds and often offers suggestions for making the forms work better.
This collaborative approach has helped Care for Women create a digital intake process tailored to its specific needs and workflows. With Lobbie's flexibility and responsive support, the practice can easily update its forms and processes to improve efficiency and the patient experience.
Their success illustrates an important lesson for clinic leaders: meaningful modernization doesn't have to be complicated. Even a focused improvement to one everyday workflow can deliver significant benefits across the entire practice.
Beyond improving efficiency and the patient experience, implementing Lobbie has also helped Care for Women reduce everyday operating expenses. By transitioning from traditional paper packets to digital intake forms, the practice has significantly reduced costs associated with paper, printing, toner, postage, employee time, scanning, and shredding.
For a busy women's healthcare practice, these expenses can quickly add up. What once required multiple steps, from printing and assembling packets to mailing, scanning, and eventually shredding document, can now be accomplished digitally in a fraction of the time.
Another meaningful benefit has been the dramatic reduction in unnecessary paper waste. Eliminating the need to print and mail large volumes of new patient paperwork has allowed Care for Women to operate more efficiently while also reducing its environmental footprint.
For Danielle, the value of Lobbie for Care for Women goes far beyond convenience. It represents a smarter use of resources, lower administrative costs, less waste, and more time for employees to focus on what matters most, providing an excellent experience for patients.
Danielle encourages other practice administrators to consider the full cost of continuing with paper compared with the investment required to move to electronic processes. The savings in staff time, the reduction in administrative work, and the improvements in patient flow all contribute to the value of modernization. And for Care for Women, the difference has been substantial enough that returning to the old process is difficult to imagine. "I can't imagine us doing paper still today. I could never go back."
Care for Women's experience demonstrates how a relatively focused technology improvement can have benefits throughout a healthcare organization. By modernizing intake, the practice has reduced paperwork, simplified the scheduling team’s responsibilities, improved patient convenience, and helped physicians maintain a more predictable appointment flow. Perhaps most importantly, it has allowed staff to redirect time away from administrative tasks and toward patient communication and support.
The lesson for other clinics is not that every organization needs to replace its entire technology infrastructure. It is that meaningful modernization often begins by identifying the processes that consume valuable time without adding meaningful value. For Care for Women, that process was paper intake. And with Lobbie, a once time-consuming administrative routine has become a simpler, more efficient part of the patient experience.
Sometimes the most valuable technology improvements are the ones that give people more time to do the work that matters most.
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