What happens when a patient texts STOP

Patients can opt out of your texts simply by replying to any of them, and the system handles it for you.

Opting out

When a patient texts STOP (or UNSUBSCRIBE, CANCEL, END or QUIT) to the sending number, two things happen:

• Their SMS marketing consent is switched off automatically on their patient record, so your records match reality.
• The mobile network itself also blocks further texts from that number to the patient. This carrier-level block applies to all texts, so a patient who texts STOP will not receive appointment reminder texts either. Their emails are unaffected and keep going out as normal.

The opt-out appears in your Messages log as an inbound row with status received, linked to the patient, so there is a clear record of when and how they opted out.

Opting back in

If the patient later texts START (or YES or UNSTOP), their SMS marketing consent is switched back on and the carrier block is lifted, and that is logged in Messages too.

What you should do

Nothing, usually; the flags keep themselves in sync. If a patient tells you in person they want texts again after texting STOP, ask them to text START to the number, because only that lifts the network-level block; ticking the box on their record alone is not enough. Casual replies that are not a recognised keyword (for example "thanks, see you then") change nothing.