Case study · Healthcare: hormone and weight-loss practice
Dr. Sue Decotiis case study: patient acquisition and retention in GoHighLevel
Client: Dr. Sue Decotiis (New York)
Services used: GoHighLevel automation, GoHighLevel setup
Dr. Sue Decotiis runs a hormone and weight-loss practice in New York that gets around 40 new leads a week, half from website forms and half from phone calls. Follow-up was a manual email and a phone call, and appointments live in the Criterions EHR. The GoHighLevel Experts built a new-patient acquisition and retention system in GoHighLevel that follows up every lead instantly, connects to the EHR through Keragon, a HIPAA-compliant integration layer, and runs reminders, no-show recovery and retention, without changing how the front desk books.
Key takeaways
- Every lead, by form or by phone, gets an instant SMS and email and a call task for the front desk.
- Booking still happens on a live call, because the consultation fee is taken by card.
- Keragon syncs “appointment booked” from the Criterions EHR to GoHighLevel, HIPAA-compliant.
- Paper consent forms became online forms with e-signature.
- Service-based retention reminders replace the practice’s old reminder tool.
The starting point
- About 40 leads a week: roughly 20 website form fills and 20 inbound calls.
- Manual follow-up: a form fill triggered a manual email reply, then a phone call.
- Booking only on a live call, because a consultation fee is collected by card upfront. The fee doubles as the no-show fee.
- Appointments live in the Criterions EHR, in person and virtual.
- A separate tool, SolutionReach, sent reminders and birthday texts.
- Heavy form spam on the website form, and consent forms on paper PDFs patients had to print and sign.
A key decision: keep the human booking
Online self-scheduling was left out on purpose. Payment has to be secured live and doctor availability varies, so the system was built around the front desk’s phone booking instead of replacing it. GoHighLevel handles everything around the booking: speed to lead, communication, the phone system, reminders, no-shows, reviews and retention. Criterions stays the source of truth for appointments.
What we built in GoHighLevel
The data foundation
Custom fields for service interest, preferred contact method, appointment type, appointment date and service purchased, and tags for lead source, booked status, visit outcome and review and referral requests.
A phone system that logs every call
A GoHighLevel phone number for outbound calls and call tracking, forwarding inbound calls to the office line, with every call logged against the patient record. Compliance was started on day one: A2P 10DLC registration for texting, CNAM so the practice name shows as caller ID, and STIR/SHAKEN attestation to reduce “Spam Likely” labels.
A 7-stage new-patient pipeline
New Lead → Attempting Contact → Engaged → Appointment Booked → Showed / Completed → No-Show → Lost / Unresponsive. Workflows move patients between stages, and the front desk works the board visually.
Forms
- One intake form replacing the website form, with service interest and preferred contact method, and reCAPTCHA to stop the spam.
- Patient consent and authorization forms rebuilt from PDFs as online forms with e-signature.
Nine workflows
- Speed-to-lead for web forms: instant SMS and email, a “call new lead” task and an alert to the front desk.
- Inbound call capture: calls forwarded and logged; unknown numbers become new leads.
- Missed-call text-back with an optional voicemail drop and a callback task.
- Appointment-booked sync: when Keragon reports a booking from Criterions, marketing stops and the confirmation goes out.
- Appointment reminders that branch by type: a join link for virtual visits, address and parking for in-person.
- No-show recovery: a “call to rebook” task and a one-tap rebook text, as a courtesy rebook since the fee is already paid.
- Reviews and referrals after a completed visit.
- Service-based retention reminders, each service on its own cadence, such as a check-in 30 days after a peptide purchase.
- Birthday messages, matching what the old tool sent.
The EHR connection through Keragon
Keragon, a HIPAA-compliant integration platform for healthcare, connects Criterions to GoHighLevel. Only booked patients sync across, not the whole lead list, and the booking signal is what stops marketing and starts reminders.
Results
- Show-up rate up 21 percent.
- About 40 new leads a week, each followed up instantly.
What other medical practices can take from this
- Don’t automate the step your business depends on doing by hand. Automate everything around it.
- Use a HIPAA-compliant connector such as Keragon to link your EHR, and sync only what the CRM needs.
- Retention reminders tied to the service a patient bought are where repeat revenue comes from.
Running a practice on GoHighLevel? See GoHighLevel setup and GoHighLevel automation.
FAQ
Can GoHighLevel integrate with an EHR?
Yes, through a HIPAA-compliant integration layer. For Dr. Sue Decotiis's practice, Keragon connects the Criterions EHR to GoHighLevel, so when an appointment is booked in the EHR, GoHighLevel stops marketing to that patient and starts confirmations and reminders.
What is Keragon?
Keragon is a HIPAA-compliant automation platform for healthcare, similar to Zapier. It connects healthcare software such as EHRs to tools like GoHighLevel.
Should a medical practice use online self-scheduling in GoHighLevel?
Not always. Dr. Sue Decotiis's practice collects a consultation fee by card on a live call and doctor availability varies, so online self-scheduling was left out on purpose and GoHighLevel was built around the front desk's phone booking.
What did The GoHighLevel Experts build for Dr. Sue Decotiis?
A new-patient acquisition and retention system: speed-to-lead for form fills and calls, a GoHighLevel phone system with missed-call text-back, a 7-stage pipeline, online consent forms with e-signature, a Keragon sync with the Criterions EHR, reminders, no-show recovery, review requests and service-based retention reminders.