How a Cincinnati Pediatric Practice Handled 6,000+ Calls a Month—and Got Their Scheduling Team Out the Door by 5
Staffing the scheduling department at this 2-location pediatric practice had become a cycle: high call volume led to burnout, burnout led to people calling in sick, and that left the team short-staffed—which made morale even worse. When a staff member quit, the practice’s leadership decided it was time to try something different.
After evaluating three vendors—and meeting the Talkie team in person at the athenahealth Thrive conference—they chose Talkie.ai. AI agent “Jessica” is now fully integrated with athenaOne and handles over 6,000 calls a month. The scheduling team is getting out on time. And the cycle of burnout has started to reverse.
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6,000+ Calls handled in a single month
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5:05 PM Staff leaving on time instead of 6:00
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3 vendors evaluated—Talkie won
ESD Pediatric Group
Website:
https://www.esdpeds.com/2 locations
in Cincinnati, Ohio
AI agent “Jessica”
“joined” the team in April 2026
Automated processes:
• Appointment scheduling
• Prescription refills
• New patient intake
• Voicemail replacement
• Message for provider (patient cases in EHR)
• 24/7 after hours service
EHR:
Specialization: Pediatrics
A Scheduling Department Under Pressure
This practice has been serving families in the Cincinnati area for over 80 years. With 6 physicians, 8 nurse practitioners, and a behavioral health specialist across 2 locations, the team is large—but the scheduling department was always under pressure.
The phones never stopped. Staff burned out. People called in sick. And the parents calling in weren’t always patient either. As Practice Administrator Leasa Horst put it:
People do tend to be meaner on the phone than in person, so it’s kind of a challenging position.
Leasa Horst
Practice Administrator at ESD Pediatric Group
When a scheduling team member quit, it became the tipping point.
I started looking at AI because I was just tired of the attitude, people calling in all the time, which led to the phone scheduling department being short-staffed, which then made the morale of the other people bad.
Why Talkie
The practice evaluated three vendors total. What set Talkie apart was the team.
After meeting Talkie in person at the Thrive conference, Leasa felt confident that the Talkie team was genuinely invested in customer success. That impression has held up.
I feel like our success is their success, and they want to really make sure that this works.
Critically, Talkie adapted to the practice’s scheduling logic rather than forcing a new one. ESD Pediatric Group doesn’t schedule by provider, which is unusual. Talkie adapted to that workflow instead of asking the practice to change it.
They work with our workflow; we don’t have to conform to theirs.
The other deciding factor: Talkie’s AI is human-trained, meaning real people continuously refine how the agent responds to patients. For a pediatric practice where parents expect warmth and accuracy, that mattered.
I think that’s probably my favorite thing about Talkie—that it is human trained.
6,000+ Calls a Month—and the Team Leaves on Time
Within weeks of going live, the impact on daily operations was measurable. AI agent “Jessica” now handles over 6,000 calls per month. She manages appointment scheduling, processes the high volume of prescription refills that come with pediatric care, creates patient cases in athenaOne, and flags completed calls for staff follow-up.
The biggest change? The scheduling team’s workday.
I had a meeting with our phone supervisor yesterday. They’re actually getting out of work on time. The other day, I walked out with them at 5:05, and they were just like, ‘Oh my gosh, we never get out of here close to 5. We’re usually out of here around 6.’ So they were all smiles.
The team also notices “Jessica” getting better over time. That’s not a coincidence—the Talkie team stays in constant contact with the practice, reviewing call data, listening to feedback, and iterating on the AI agent’s behavior. Adoption improves week by week, and the staff has seen firsthand how the AI handles more with each passing day.
Rolling It Out to Parents
Introducing AI to a pediatric patient base means talking to parents—and getting them comfortable with the change. The practice leaned on Talkie’s implementation guide, which includes real-life scenarios and sample scripts for how front desk staff can encourage parents to use the AI assistant.
They didn’t follow it word-for-word. Instead, they tailored the materials to fit their patient population and internal workflows. The approach worked: adoption has been steadily climbing.
Talkie provides pretty good real-life scenarios and sample scripts of how to encourage utilization. We kind of tailored them to our workflow and our patient population.
Ahead of the Curve
For this practice’s leadership, the decision to adopt AI wasn’t just about solving today’s staffing problem. It was about positioning the practice for what’s coming.
AI is new, it’s the wave of the future, so we could either wait and implement it later and be behind the technology bubble, or we can be ahead of the technology bubble. I prefer to be ahead rather than behind.
Nobody likes change, so you just have to kind of be patient and work through it.
AI agent “Jessica” now handles thousands of calls each month—scheduling appointments, processing prescription refills, creating patient cases, and freeing the team to focus on the families walking through the door. The scheduling department that was once a source of constant friction is now a team that leaves work on time, with smiles on their faces.
I can’t say this enough—the Talkie team wants you to succeed.
See how AI agents could support your practice
Talkie’s AI agents will help you instantly answer 100% patient calls, and significantly free up your front-end team.
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Reduce your staff workload and burnout
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Automate up to 85% of the most repetitive calls like scheduling, Rx refills, and FAQs
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Reduce call center operational costs by 60%