Why Robocalls Are Even Worse Than You Thought [telecom]

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Important connections get missed and legitimate businesses lose money when consumers no longer pick up the phone

By Tim Harper

Last updated: May 15, 2019

Adam Cheriff, M.D., is chief of clinical operations for Weill Cornell Medicine, the giant health system with 1.8 million patient-visits a year. He and his colleagues are also on the front lines of the robocall wars, because he sees firsthand the negative impact as people no longer reliably answer their phones.

It works like this, Cheriff says: A person sees a doctor and is referred to a specialist. But when the specialist's office tries to call the patient for an appointment, no one answers the phone. The patient - not recognizing the incoming phone number - sometimes assumes it's a robocall and refuses to answer, Cheriff and others at Weill Cornell have concluded.