Secure Patient Messaging

No. You control exactly when patients can reply. Two-way messaging can be toggled on or off at the clinic, provider, or individual patient level. When inbound messaging is enabled, Cortico’s automation handles roughly 80% of common requests (cancellations, contact updates, form requests) without any staff involvement at all.

Cortico’s patient messaging is appropriate for most routine clinical and administrative communication that doesn’t require a synchronous visit.

Common use cases include:

1. Delivering requisitions or results to the patient after a visit.
2. Requesting a form to be filled prior to the visit.
3. Sharing referrals and specialist correspondence.
4. Delivering hand-outs or post-visit instructions quickly and easily.
5. Asking patients to book a follow-up with your clinic or another clinic, with an actionable link.
6. Requesting intake forms before appointments.
7. Handling insurance forms, invoices,

As a leading healthcare patient scheduling software, Cortico integrates with Epic, Oracle Health, Oscar, Accuro, Profile, MedAccess, AdvancedMD, Practice Fusion, and more (full list on our integrations page). The integration is real-time and bidirectional. If you use a different EMR, please contact us — we add new integrations regularly.

Secure messaging for healthcare generally refers to a communication platform that meets medical-grade privacy standards like HIPAA in the US, and PIPEDA and provincial laws (PHIPA, PIPA) in Canada. It encrypts data end-to-end, authenticates users before granting access, and maintains a full audit trail of every message sent or opened.

Cortico is a purpose-built medical patient messaging system, not a repurposed consumer texting tool. Where plain SMS sends clinical information across carriers in unencrypted plain text, Cortico sends only a notification — the actual message stays encrypted inside the patient portal, requires identity verification, and logs automatically to the chart.

Not without the right platform. Standard SMS and email are unencrypted, so any patient information sent through them can violate HIPAA, PIPEDA, and most other medical privacy standards. Compliant platforms like Cortico send only a notification by SMS or email, while the clinical message itself stays inside an encrypted portal that requires identity verification to access it.

No. SMS isn’t encrypted in transit, doesn’t authenticate the recipient, and can be stored by carriers — all of which fail HIPAA’s Security Rule when protected health information (PHI) is involved. Any medical text messaging that contains PHI needs to move through a purpose-built compliant channel.

HIPAA compliant texting is any text-based messaging channel that satisfies the HIPAA Security Rule, and it’s the foundation of any HIPAA-compliant messaging app built for clinical use. The core HIPAA compliant texting requirements are: encryption in transit and at rest, user authentication, role-based access controls, comprehensive audit logs, and a signed Business Associate Agreement (BAA) with your platform vendor.