How to Schedule Automated Text Message Alerts and Notifications in REDCap with Mosio

Want to send automated text message alerts and notifications from REDCap? This guide shows you how to schedule SMS alerts and notifications through Mosio’s REDCap integration — including welcome messages, appointment reminders, recurring check-ins, and study enrollment confirmations. Use REDCap’s built-in alerts system with Mosio to reach participants directly on their phones.

You can schedule REDCap alerts and notifications to be sent via text message with Mosio. The alerts do not need to contain a survey link (as with survey invitations).

Because REDCap versions and settings are different at every organization, it is best to check with your admins to see how to best manage it for your use case.

Transcript:

Hey, this is Jay from Mosio. And this is Noel from Mosio. So Jay, what happens if people want to send an alert or notification and not include a REDCap Survey invitation? Yeah.

So that's where we're going to head over to alerts and notifications in REDCap. I've got our message over here in the character counter. It's one segment. Nice message I want to send out.

So I'm going to head into REDCap under create a new alert. I'm actually going to set up a welcome text message. So this way when if I enroll a subject in this project they're going to immediately receive a text message. If they happen to be in the clinic then I can see them get it right away in front of me.

Otherwise it just lets them know, well it sends them the texting phone number that they're going to receive survey links on and they can see, they can basically get an introduction from you as to what that phone number is. Yeah, this is really helpful in situations where having them save your number, your project number in their contacts, makes it so they have a quick reference when they see additional text messages come in. Yeah, exactly. And so we're getting to how will this be triggered.

I'm going to do it when a record is saved. I'm picking my subject enrollment instrument. I'm going to do it with any form status but you can choose complete only. I'm sending it immediately just once and then down at alert type I'm picking SMS text.

I'm choosing my phone number field. Oops, there it is. And then I'm pasting in my message from the character counter in Mosio. And then hit save.

So that'll come up. Once that's saved, now when I head over to my test subject and I save and exit, that message should go out right away. And there it is. Perfect.

So in terms of alerts and notifications that are repeating, so someone wants to send, say, text-based interventions or reminders to complete tasks that don't include the links. Yeah, that's good. That's another one under alerts and notifications. So this one, again, you can choose how to trigger it, but what you're really looking at is how many times.

So you can send it multiple times. I have the same settings as before. I'm sending it the next day at 9 a.m. Multiple times. So every seven days after it's sent, it will send up to four times.

So that's basically a weekly message from the day after enrollment. And then again, it's, SMS message and paste your message in at the bottom. Once you save it, then as you enroll people, these alerts will get set up. They can get more complex or less complex depending on what you need to do.

If you have specific questions, I would head back to your REDCap admin. Every REDCap project is different. You want to make sure you're sending it out correctly. You also want to give yourself a bit of time to test it.

Get a test subject in there with your phone number and try it out just to make sure it works. Make sure that you're getting that message when you expect it. Um, but that's it. Awesome.

Thanks a lot Jay. Yeah. Thank you.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can I send recurring text messages from REDCap?

A: Yes. REDCap’s alerts and notifications system supports recurring messages. You can configure alerts to send multiple times at set intervals — for example, a weekly reminder every 7 days, up to a maximum number of sends you define.

Q: How do I set up a welcome text message when a participant enrolls?

A: Create a new alert in REDCap, set it to trigger when a record is saved on your enrollment instrument, choose SMS as the alert type, select your phone number field, and compose your message. The participant will receive the text immediately upon enrollment.

Q: Do REDCap SMS alerts work the same as email alerts?

A: Yes. SMS alerts use the same trigger logic, timing, and scheduling options as email alerts. The key difference is that SMS does not support text formatting (bold, italics, etc.) — keep your messages short and in plain text.

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