From enquiry to booking

Missed appointments in Saudi Arabia: what the studies show, and what they leave open

Saudi studies show that missed appointments are common and that reminders reduce them. Evidence on Ramadan and summer is thin, so track your own pattern first.

Naqar Digital team6 October 2026 · 4 min read

Saudi studies show that missed appointments are common and that reminders reduce them. At 16 outpatient clinics in one Riyadh hospital, non-attendance fell from 23.9% to 19.8% after text reminders were linked to the medical record. Evidence on how Ramadan or summer affect booked clinic visits in the Kingdom is thin, so measure your own pattern before planning around a season.

What Saudi studies document

Reminders. A study in the Saudi Medical Journal (2012, volume 33, issue 2) followed 16 outpatient clinics at King Abdulaziz Medical City in Riyadh. Non-attendance was 23.9% in 2008 and 19.8% in 2009, after SMS reminders were linked to the medical record. It compares a year before with a year after, so other changes may have contributed too.

How common. A survey at an internal medicine clinic in Riyadh, January to March 2021, with 211 patients, found that 51.7% had missed a visit in the previous two months, according to a paper in the Bahrain Medical Bulletin (December 2024). We have seen these figures in a summary of the paper and are confirming them against the full text.

Why patients miss

The same Riyadh survey reported three main reasons:

  • Forgetting: 57.3%
  • Work or home commitments: 42.7%
  • Transport: 9.5%

Forgetting is the reason reminders address directly. Work and home commitments point to two other fixes: an easy way to move the appointment, and slots that suit working hours.

Our earlier article on missed appointments explains how to put a monthly figure on the loss.

What we know about Ramadan and summer

Little, so far.

  • A study of a tertiary emergency department in Riyadh (2009 to 2013), published in the Annals of Saudi Medicine according to its DOAJ listing, found that 60% of Ramadan patients came at night, with little change in admissions or severity. This is emergency care, which works differently from booked clinics.
  • The only study we found linking Ramadan to clinic no-shows is from Oman: across 14 primary care centres (2014 to 2017), Ramadan appointments had higher odds of a no-show, according to the Oman Medical Journal.

We found no Saudi peer-reviewed data on Ramadan or summer demand for booked clinic visits. Plan with common sense, and let your own records settle the question.

Practical steps

  1. Send two reminders: one 48 hours before and one 3 hours before, each with a one-tap option to reschedule.
  2. Use WhatsApp as the reminder channel. The CST's Saudi Internet Report 2025 puts WhatsApp use at 92.7% of users, the highest of any platform. Review our note on WhatsApp pricing from October 2026 before adding more messages.
  3. Include the location link and parking note in the second reminder, for patients who struggle with transport.
  4. During Ramadan, offer evening slots and send reminders after iftar. This is practical sense; we present it without a statistic behind it.
  5. When a patient cancels, offer the next two available times in the same message.

Connecting the booking system to WhatsApp so this runs on its own is part of the Integration & Automation service.

How to check it is working

  • No-show rate each month: missed visits ÷ booked visits. Keep 12 months before drawing any seasonal conclusion.
  • No-show rate by weekday and by time of day. Patterns here are often clearer than seasonal ones.
  • Share of reminders that lead to a reschedule. A rising number is good: the slot can be offered to someone else.
  • No-show rate for patients who received both reminders, compared with those who received one or none.

Common questions

Do appointment reminders reduce no-shows in Saudi Arabia?

A Riyadh study of 16 outpatient clinics recorded a fall from 23.9% to 19.8% after SMS reminders were linked to the medical record (Saudi Medical Journal, 2012).

Do Saudi clinics see more no-shows in Ramadan?

No Saudi peer-reviewed study of booked clinics answers this. One Omani study found higher no-show odds in Ramadan. Track your own data for 12 months.

What is the most common reason patients miss appointments?

In a 2021 Riyadh survey of 211 patients, forgetting was cited by 57.3%, followed by work or home commitments at 42.7%.

Sources

More articles

Scroll to Top