Buy a practice appointment planner or design it yourself?
A finished appointment planner has a fixed structure. Times, columns and daily allocations have already been created. This is appropriate when the practice has fixed appointment lengths and clear processes.
A self-designed appointment planner offers more freedom. It is suitable when different treatment times, several rooms or frequent emergency appointments must be taken into account.
We will now start with our purchase recommendations and then move on to the DIY version:
Buy a practice appointment planner: models, prices & recommendations
1. Anschütz practice planner
A DIN A4 appointment planner. It shows a week on two pages and works every 15 minutes from 7:00 to 20:45 (Monday to Friday). One column per day. Saturday and Sunday are also included, on a separate column.
- advantages: Easy to read time structure thanks to alternating background colors. Long day coverage until 20:45.
- Disadvantages: For practices with multiple practitioners, quickly limited as only one column per day.
2. RUCK practice schedule
A classic provider with a proven appointment planner model in DIN A5 format. Also every 15 minutes. Available in ring binding Possible with one or 4 columns. Good workmanship Prices are in the range of around €20.
- advantages: Solid material quality, good layout basis for everyday practice. Several columns are possible.
- Disadvantages: Probably too small if there are more than four doctors.
3. sport‑tec appointment planner organizer
A practical DIN A4 appointment planner with a selectable number of columns (2, 4 or 6) and flexible timing (15 or 20 minutes). The price starts at around 15.95€ and increases depending on the number of columns and whether Saturday is carried along.
- advantages: Good balance between price, function and structure: Enough for many practice sizes.
- Disadvantages: With 6 columns, the fields are too small for some. Entries may be harder to read.
4th KOCHDIALOG XXL Practice Planner 2026
A large-format appointment planner in DIN A3, designed for many doctors/therapists or rooms at the same time. Ideal for larger practices with high volumes of appointments or parallel processes. The price is in the range of 36.95€.
- advantages: Plenty of space, clear overview, suitable for more complex structures. Long day coverage until 20:45.
- Disadvantages: Size requires appropriate space at the reception, possibly oversized for a small individual practice. Despite its size, only one column per day.
Design your own practice schedule: ideas and tips
Having your own appointment planner is worthwhile if everyday practice doesn't fit into a standard grid. For example, when appointments vary in length, several rooms are used in parallel or emergencies occur regularly.
Important steps in designing:
- Define daily structure: Which times are relevant? From when until when is treatment carried out? Are there fixed breaks?
- Define appointment lengths: Are 15 minutes always allocated? Or are there 10, 20 and 30 minutes depending on performance?
- Consider rooms and people: Does every doctor or therapist need their own column? Or is one column enough?
- Plan emergency and buffer times: Fixed gaps reduce stress and waiting times.
- Saturdays and holidays: Only record if they are actually used regularly.
Tips for implementation on paper or digitally:
- paper: The easiest way to work with Word or Excel templates.
- Digitally: When the schedule is being used by multiple computers at the same time. Everyone immediately sees the latest entries without sending files back and forth.
- Use color sparingly: Just for orientation, not for decoration.
- Plan fields big enough: So that handwritten entries remain legible.
Important: First define processes, then build the calendar around them, not the other way around.
Digital alternatives: appointment scheduling software for practices
Digital appointment planners solve many of the problems of traditional paper calendars: Several employees can plan at the same time, changes are immediately visible, appointment confirmations and reminders run automatically. This reduces telephone volumes and waiting times.
Here are 3 established solutions:
1st Dr. Flex
With Dr. Flex, patients can book appointments directly via the practice website or the Dr. Flex portal. They can manage their appointments themselves around the clock — i.e. book, reschedule or cancel. The calendar is automatically synchronized with the practice system. Ideal for practices that offer online bookings while maintaining full control over available times.
2nd Doctolib
Appointments can be booked, postponed or canceled online — directly into the practice calendar. Reception sees free time slots in real time and has to make fewer calls. Well suited when there are many appointment requests.
3rd Saturday
Digital calendar with online booking and a clear overview of available times and rooms. Changes are immediately visible to everyone. Useful for practices with several treatment rooms or staff changes at reception.
Note: These systems can largely replace the paper calendar if the team works completely digitally. In practices with a lot of spontaneous handwritten planning, a combination of both (digital tools + analog appointment planner) can be useful.
Next step: digitally organize your practice
A practice appointment planner provides structure in the calendar, but it does not solve the actual bottlenecks in everyday life in many practices:
Forms, documents, numerous telephone inquiries, statements and post-processing. That is where most of the time is lost. Put here digital solutions such as Nelly on.
What can be digitally represented with Nelly:
- anamnesis and educational documents are filled out digitally before the appointment: on a smartphone, via link or QR code.
- Consents and signatures are obtained online in a legally secure manner (instead of chased after at reception).
- Review reminders can be sent automatically, without extra effort on the part of the team.
- invoices are created, sent and paid digitally as part of of factorings (including credit check and receivables management).
Outcome: Less paper. Less follow-up. Less stress at the reception. More overview. More predictability. More time for patients.
We are happy to advise you without obligationWhat digitizing your practice might look like in your specific case.
