How we verify a patient writing from a different number

When a patient messages the assistant from a number or email the clinic has no record of, she cannot see their history or their appointments. To restore that access, the assistant asks them to verify their identity with a one-time code.

This guide explains what happens, what the patient sees, and what you should do when something goes wrong.

Why it exists

A national ID number does not prove who is writing. It is printed on a card, read aloud in waiting rooms, and shared to book a hotel. If saying it were enough, anyone could ask for someone else’s appointments.

So the assistant sends a code to a channel the clinic already has on the patient’s record — never to the number or email the visitor just typed. Only the person who receives that code can continue.

What happens in the conversation

1. The patient says they are already a patient and gives their document number.
2. The assistant sends a 6-digit code to the channel on file.
3. The patient types the code into the chat.
4. The conversation is linked to their record.

From their next message onward, the assistant can show their appointments, cancel them, or reschedule.

What the assistant never says

The answer is the same whether or not the document exists in the system:

If the document is registered and has a contact channel, we sent a 6-digit code.

This is deliberate. If the assistant replied “that document is not registered”, anyone could find out who is a patient of the clinic — and in a psychiatry or fertility practice, that answer alone is already health information.

For the same reason, the assistant does not say which channel it sent the code to. Saying “check your email” would reveal that the clinic has that person’s email address.

Security limits

Once the attempts run out the code is void and a new one must be requested.

When a person has to step in

The assistant hands the conversation to your team in these cases. In all of them verification cannot resolve it alone:

• The patient has no phone or email on their record. There is nowhere to send the code. Someone on the team must confirm their identity and update the record.
• The conversation already belongs to another verified patient. It cannot be reassigned from the chat; this is a safeguard against conversation hijacking.
• The patient withdrew their data-processing authorization. Ley 1581 forbids contacting them, so no code is sent.

If the patient says it never arrived

Check, in this order:

1. The patient’s record has a phone or an email. If it is empty the code was never sent — update it and ask them to try again.
2. The channel on file is the one the patient is looking at. The code goes to whatever is on the record, which may be an old address.
3. They have not passed the limit of 3 codes in 24 hours.

⚠️ Never read the code out to the patient or ask for it through another channel. If you can read it, it stops being proof of identity.