Introduction

Dr. Keith Thompson is a solo family physician based in an urban Ontario setting, with over 33 years of experience delivering full-spectrum care. His lean clinic supports approximately 2,500 rostered patients under a FHO (Family Health Organization) capitated model. The practice is operated by Dr. Thompson and one MOA, with part-time allied health support for chronic care (e.g. COPD). Clinical documentation is managed in Accuro EMR, which until recently relied heavily on manual fax workflows.

Challenges

With approximately 900 faxes arriving each month, fax handling had become a constant administrative load. The volume included refill requests, consult notes, imaging and lab reports, and updates from external providers. In a two-person clinic, every manual step adds up, and the repetitive work of sorting, identifying the patient, and routing documents creates both time drain and inbox pressure. As Yvonne put it, “My inbox was always full, day or night. On weekends, there would be many faxes waiting for me — now sometimes there are none.” The clinic needed a way to reduce the manual burden without introducing risk into patient-file handling or forcing a complex process change.

Solution & Implementation

To streamline document intake, the clinic implemented Phelix AI’s Inbox Agent for automated fax triage inside their existing workflow. Phelix AI matches faxes to the right patient and organizes documents so staff spend less time on repetitive sorting and demographic lookups. This helps reduce manual effort while keeping appropriate oversight when needed. Dr. Thompson emphasized that the value is in automating the sorting work, not removing human control: “There’s always a human in the loop. All this is really doing is automating the sorting process.”

For the clinic, a major workflow unlock was autosave and routing logic that reduced how often Yvonne needed to act as the middle step between incoming faxes and Dr. Thompson. “Refills now bypass me entirely — they go right to Dr. Thompson. And the autosave logic works great. I can also set thresholds to reduce errors,” said Yvonne. Alongside the product itself, Dr. Thompson highlighted the importance of responsive support when clinic workflows are on the line: “My concerns were heard and you were immediately responsive. And the support is phenomenal… when there’s a problem, I need to speak to somebody.”

Conclusion

By implementing Phelix AI’s Inbox Agent, Dr. Thompson’s clinic reduced the time spent on fax document handling by approximately 70%, which is a meaningful shift for a solo practice with one MOA. With 900 faxes per month coming in, the reduced admin burden translates into an estimated ~7 hours saved per week. More importantly, it reduced the constant inbox overwhelm and after-hours catch-up work that tends to creep into lean clinic operations. As Dr. Thompson described it: “That currency of time… has been such a mental relief… to be able to look and see an inbox that’s empty sometimes.”