Sponsor Spotlight: 1Call, a Division of Amtelco

Providing the one complete communications system designed to bring it all together

The 1Call Division of Amtelco, formed in 1997, is dedicated to serving the unique call center and communication needs of healthcare organizations.  1Call focuses on delivering tools to allow patients, physicians, and staff to communicate together as a well-synchronized team.

Exceeding Customers’ Needs: Every patient deserves the best care possible.  1Call’s goal is to provide healthcare organizations with the tools to efficiently handle caller’s requests with a single phone call, saving time, eliminating confusion, and providing patients with the best service possible.

By continuing to meet and exceed customers’ needs, the list of 1Call customers continues to grow.  1Call has hundreds of healthcare customers throughout the US and Canada, both large and small.  A snapshot of 1Call customers include: Allina Health System, Anmed Health Medical Center, Bassett Healthcare, Bethesda Healthcare, Billings Clinic, Fairview Health System, Hennepin County Medical Center, Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, Sherman Hospital, St. Francis Hospital, University of Augusta Health Care System, University of Nebraska Medical Center, and University of Washington Medical Center.

Innovation: 1Call designs high-performance software applications to offer robust systems that provide hospital-wide communications.  Frequent software releases give customers access to the newest features and technology.  The 1Call systems furnish seamless integrations with existing legacy IT and PBX networks to save costs and bring information together in a single location, as well as including VoIP and SIP integrations.

The 1Call Modules Include:

• Call Center Systems: The Infinity system is used by hundreds of hospitals and healthcare organizations.  Infinity can be designed for small or large organizations with as few as three to as many as 200 agent/operator stations. 

• PC-Based ACD Agent Stations: Infinity agent/operator stations allow users to make the most of triage, scheduling, physician referral, appointment taking, and other IS programs by adding essential functionality, including ACD call routing, call recording, statistics and reporting, desktop access to all IS modules, screen-based speed dialing, on-call schedules, and Web-based directories.

• Flexible Call Scripting: Script calls for operators for any hospital-wide application, including patient-to-physician referral, physician-to-physician referral, appointment taking, and class registration.

• On-Call Scheduling: Allows physicians and staff members hospital-wide to enter their own on-call schedules; the information that operators see is always current.

• Directories with Individual Contact Methods: Paging, text messaging/SMS, email, and however staff needs to receive communications.

• Pro Show Appointment Reminders:  Automates appointment reminders for patients to help keep physicians’ schedules full.  Reminders are sent via email, cell phone, PDA, text-to-speech phone call, and IVR. 

• “Just Say It” Speech Recognition: Gives internal and external callers an easy way to reach the correct person or department when they “just say it.”

• IVR: Uses Interactive Voice Response (IVR) to automate routine phone calls, such as appointment taking, appointment reminders, class registration, help desk, and physician referral.

• Call Conferencing: Easily creates multi-party conferences, with or without operator assistance.

• Voice Logger: Automatically records all calls with screen captures, giving the data needed to ensure accuracy and compliance. 

• Browser-based Applications: Provides convenient access to on-call schedules, directories, patient census, and paging.

Speeding Response Times: When every second counts, organizations need to respond quickly.  1Call’s Red Alert emergency and event notification system has proven to help organizations get personnel to the right place at the right time.  Red Alert issues automated alerts by phone, mobile phone, SMS, email, pager, or other methods, ensuring that responders quickly receive alerts.  Red Alert is ideal for use in every department for handling code calls, staff shortages, meeting reminders, contingency planning (JCAHO), emergencies (HICS), network outages, scheduled – or unscheduled – events, and weather emergencies. 

Featuring 5-Star Service and Support: 1Call works closely with each healthcare and higher education organization and has a reputation for complete, professional system support, offering training, installation, and technical support staff on-call 24/7.  1Call’s 5-Star Service and Support is more than just a slogan; it’s included with every 1Call system:

• An Informed Customer Care Group: Project managers and the innovation development team work with customers before, during, and long after the installation of 1Call equipment.

• Experienced Trainers and Installers: Receive detailed training and a smooth installation to help streamline communications for the entire organization.  Continuing education opportunities ensure customers are able to utilize the newest features.

• Knowledgeable Field Engineers: Call or email for field engineering specialists to assist with technical questions.

• On-Line Resource Library and Tech Helper: Available 24/7 for instant answers.

• Healthcare Call Center User’s Group: The NAEO (National Amtelco Equipment Owners) group gives valuable support and a creative community for sharing ideas.

Early History: 1Call has a strong history in the telemessaging industry.  Amtelco, the parent company of 1Call, was founded in 1976 to provide computer-based telemessaging solutions to the answering service and medical messaging industry.  Bill Curtin, the founder of Amtelco, first received a telecommunications patent in 1951.  Since then, Amtelco has added an additional 28 patents.

Amtelco Today: Under the leadership of Chairwoman of the Board, Eleanor Curtin, and President, Tom Curtin, Amtelco currently employs over 150 personnel in solutions development, customer care, field engineering, manufacturing, and administrative staff located at Amtelco’s main office in Wisconsin.

Amtelco also has twelve sales offices throughout the U.S. and Canada.  In addition to the healthcare and higher education industries served by 1Call, the Amtelco TAS group handles the telephone answering service industry, and the Amtelco XDS group provides computer telephony boards to developers around the world. 

The Future: 1Call is dedicated to continuing to provide healthcare and higher education organizations with the modules and features needed to offer more services while containing costs.  By working closely with customers, 1Call will continue to develop innovative features and products. 

Highlights

• 1954: Bill Curtin, Amtelco’s founder, receives a US patent on Telesignal, the first concentrator/identifier. 

• 1976: Amtelco is founded to develop, install, and service products in the commercial telephone answering service market.

• 1977: Amtelco installs its first computer telephony integration (CTI) system named Video III.

• 1983: Amtelco develops EVE (Electronic Video Exchange), the first paperless ACD and CTI product.

• 1988: PC-MX, Amtelco’s first-generation PC-based ACD CTI product, is introduced.  PC-MX is a patented product that featured paperless messaging and voice processing features.

• 1993: The Infinity system is introduced.  Infinity is the third-generation, PC-based CTI product.  Evolving from the PC-MX system, the open architecture Infinity system allows users to take advantage of off-the-shelf PC technology.

• 1997: Amtelco launches 1Call Division to develop products and service healthcare and higher education markets.

• 1998: 1Call develops over 150 new features on the Infinity platform. 

• 1999: Infinity software version 5 is introduced.

• 2000: The eCreator system is introduced, using scripts to simplify complex calls for appointment taking, class registration, and physician referral.  Infinity Software Version 5.1 and Voice Logger are introduced.

• 2001: 1Call offers eLink Hosted Services, and Infinity introduces eResponse, giving organizations an easy way to respond to email messages.

• 2002: eCreator Software Version 2.0 is introduced, including IVR and appointment reminders.  Infinity adds conference bridge.

• 2003: 1Call introduces Red Alert emergency notification, “Just Say It” speech recognition, and Infinity software version 5.2.

• 2004: Infinity IS (Intelligent Series) is introduced with Infinity software version 5.3.  Infinity IS features innovative enhancements for messaging, on-call scheduling, directories, and dispatching.  The Resource Library is also introduced, allowing customers to share Infinity, eCreator, and IVR scripts.

• 2006: Infinity software version 5.4 is released, with Infinity IS enhancements.  Red Alert adds mapping capabilities, making it easy to trigger alerts for specific areas. 

• 2007: 1Call introduces Discovery Forums, which are led by customers and give participants another way to network and share ideas.

• 2008: 1Call introduces Infinity software version 5.5 with Infinity IS enhancements, the Infinity IS soft agent, and receives a patent for “A System and Method for Intelligent Script Swapping.”

• 2009: 1Call introduces Synergy HL7, which instantly communicates HL7 data to the personnel who need it.  Synergy HL7 is a performance improvement tool that provides advanced, automated notification technology.  Red Alert adds ESRI® and Google™ mapping capabilities.  1Call receives a patent for “System and Method for Dynamically Creating Records” for IS scripting which creates a record in the CMI database

Contact 1Call at 800-356-9148, info@1call.com, or www.1call.com.

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