Patents by Inventor Kenneth A Darby

Kenneth A Darby has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 11282153
    Abstract: Medical services are offered by various facilities near a patient's residence. The number of facility optimization procedures continues to grow and the patients and facilities can now apply new logic processes and patient incentives, etc., to maximize efficiency and budgetary concerns. One example method of operation provides receiving a request to schedule a medical care visit at a medical facility from a user device associated with a user account, scheduling the first appointment for a first appointment time on an appointment list and identifying an open appointment time in the appointment list for the same day. The method may also include transmitting a notification to the user device associated with a user account that is eligible for an appointment rescheduling event, and receiving a response message confirming a schedule change responsive to the notification being transmitted the user device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 21, 2014
    Date of Patent: March 22, 2022
    Assignee: INTRADO CORPORATION
    Inventors: Douglas R. Albro, Kenneth A. Darby, Robert J. Dudzinski, Michael J. Masching, Pamela Ann Mortenson, Bruce Pollock, Hendryanto Rilantono
  • Patent number: 11114190
    Abstract: Medical services are offered by various facilities near a patient's residence. The number of facility options continues to grow and the patients can now identify rankings and offer their own input regarding satisfaction of certain facilities. One example method of operation provides identifying a number of feedback messages associated with a particular medical facility, parsing the feedback messages to identify negative feedback associated with the feedback messages, notifying the medical facility of the negative feedback, and transmitting suggestions to increase productivity and reduce subsequent negative feedback messages for subsequent patient visits to the medical facility.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 16, 2019
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2021
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Douglas R. Albro, Kenneth A. Darby, Robert J. Dudzinski, Michael J. Masching, Pamela Ann Mortenson, Bruce Pollock, Hendryanto Rilantono
  • Patent number: 10594840
    Abstract: An example operation may include one or more of receiving a bot communication request from a user device, the bot communication request comprising content from on one or more of a spoken utterance and a typed input received via the user device, retrieving configuration information comprising credentials and unique communication protocol information for each of a plurality of bot services, automatically determining a bot service for responding to the bot communication request from among the plurality of bot services, and establishing a communication channel with the determined bot service based on unique credentials of the determined bot service, and transmitting the bot communication request to the determined bot service via the established communication channel based on unique communication protocol information of the determined bot service.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 23, 2018
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2020
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Kenneth A. Darby, Geoffrey A. Finch, Sammy Sufian
  • Patent number: 10262384
    Abstract: Medical services are offered by various facilities near a patient's residence. The number of facility options continues to grow and the patients can now identify rankings and offer their own input regarding satisfaction of certain facilities. One example method of operation provides identifying a number of feedback messages associated with a particular medical facility, parsing the feedback messages to identify negative feedback associated with the feedback messages, notifying the medical facility of the negative feedback, and transmitting suggestions to increase productivity and reduce subsequent negative feedback messages for subsequent patient visits to the medical facility.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 21, 2014
    Date of Patent: April 16, 2019
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Douglas R. Albro, Kenneth A. Darby, Robert J. Dudzinski, Michael J. Masching, Pamela Ann Mortenson, Bruce Pollock, Hendryanto Rilantono
  • Patent number: 10074059
    Abstract: Medical services are offered by various facilities near a patient's residence. The number of facility optimization procedures continues to grow and the patients and facilities can now apply new logic processes and patient profiling, etc., to maximize efficiency and budgetary concerns. One example method of operation provides receiving a request to schedule a medical care visit at a medical facility and identifying a user account associated with the request and the user's medical history. The method may also include identifying the user account as having a delinquent compliance score, and scheduling the medical care visit in a delinquent appointment time slot.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 21, 2014
    Date of Patent: September 11, 2018
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Douglas R. Albro, Kenneth A. Darby, Robert J. Dudzinski, Michael J. Masching, Pamela Ann Mortenson, Bruce Pollock, Hendryanto Rilantono
  • Patent number: 9911115
    Abstract: The illustrative embodiments described herein provide systems and methods for conducting transactions with a customer using text messages. In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a first text message from a mobile communication device associated with a customer. The first text message includes a request from the customer to receive one or more text messages from a vendor. The method also includes adding the customer to a set of consenting customers in a customer database in response to receiving the first text message. The set of consenting customer including customers that consent to receiving text messages from the vendor. The method also includes sending a second text message to the mobile communication device. The second text message is associated with a service offered by the vendor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 28, 2017
    Date of Patent: March 6, 2018
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Chad David Hendren, Kenneth A. Darby, James Frazier, Steven Gass, Sandra Stetich
  • Patent number: 9607345
    Abstract: The illustrative embodiments described herein provide systems and methods for conducting transactions with a customer using text messages. In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a first text message from a mobile communication device associated with a customer. The first text message includes a request from the customer to receive one or more text messages from a vendor. The method also includes adding the customer to a set of consenting customers in a customer database in response to receiving the first text message. The set of consenting customer including customers that consent to receiving text messages from the vendor. The method also includes sending a second text message to the mobile communication device. The second text message is associated with a service offered by the vendor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 22, 2015
    Date of Patent: March 28, 2017
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Chad David Hendren, Kenneth A. Darby, James Frazer, Steven Gass, Sandra Stetich
  • Patent number: 9253324
    Abstract: A system, method, and computer readable medium for utilizing agent availability by an outdial application are provided. A routine may be periodically run by an outdial server that evaluates agent availability in a call center backend. If any agents are available, the routine may schedule a pre-defined number of calls per available agent. A number of phone numbers corresponding to the number of scheduled calls may then be fetched by the routine from a phone number database. Once calls are initiated by the outdial server, the routine again checks if any agents are available. In the event that an agent is available, a scheduled phone number is retrieved, and a call is placed thereto and connected with an available agent. After a successful call connection is made, the outdial application may again check the agent availability. If no agent is available, the outdial application may reschedule itself.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 7, 2014
    Date of Patent: February 2, 2016
    Inventors: Kenneth A. Darby, Jason J. Kroh
  • Patent number: 9143831
    Abstract: The illustrative embodiments described herein provide systems and methods for conducting transactions with a customer using text messages. In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a first text message from a mobile communication device associated with a customer. The first text message includes a request from the customer to receive one or more text messages from a vendor. The method also includes adding the customer to a set of consenting customers in a customer database in response to receiving the first text message. The set of consenting customer including customers that consent to receiving text messages from the vendor. The method also includes sending a second text message to the mobile communication device. The second text message is associated with a service offered by the vendor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 4, 2014
    Date of Patent: September 22, 2015
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Chad David Hendren, Kenneth A. Darby, James Frazer, Steven Gass, Sandra Stetich
  • Patent number: 8897439
    Abstract: A system, method, and computer readable medium for utilizing agent availability by an outdial application are provided. A routine may be periodically run by an outdial server that evaluates agent availability in a call center backend. If any agents are available, the routine may schedule a pre-defined number of calls per available agent. A number of phone numbers corresponding to the number of scheduled calls may then be fetched by the routine from a phone number database. Once calls are initiated by the outdial server, the routine again checks if any agents are available. In the event that an agent is available, a scheduled phone number is retrieved, and a call is placed thereto and connected with an available agent. After a successful call connection is made, the outdial application may again check the agent availability. If no agent is available, the outdial application may reschedule itself.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 14, 2014
    Date of Patent: November 25, 2014
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Kenneth A. Darby, Jason J. Kroh
  • Patent number: 8839311
    Abstract: The illustrative embodiments described herein provide systems and methods for conducting transactions with a customer using text messages. In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a first text message from a mobile communication device associated with a customer. The first text message includes a request from the customer to receive one or more text messages from a vendor. The method also includes adding the customer to a set of consenting customers in a customer database in response to receiving the first text message. The set of consenting customer including customers that consent to receiving text messages from the vendor. The method also includes sending a second text message to the mobile communication device. The second text message is associated with a service offered by the vendor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 26, 2013
    Date of Patent: September 16, 2014
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Chad David Hendren, Kenneth A. Darby, James Frazer, Steven Gass, Sandra Stetich
  • Patent number: 8693674
    Abstract: A system, method, and computer readable medium for utilizing agent availability by an outdial application are provided. A routine may be periodically run by an outdial server that evaluates agent availability in a call center backend. If any agents are available, the routine may schedule a pre-defined number of calls per available agent. A number of phone numbers corresponding to the number of scheduled calls may then be fetched by the routine from a phone number database. Once calls are initiated by the outdial server, the routine again checks if any agents are available. In the event that an agent is available, a scheduled phone number is retrieved, and a call is placed thereto and connected with an available agent. After a successful call connection is made, the outdial application may again check the agent availability. If no agent is available, the outdial application may reschedule itself.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 28, 2007
    Date of Patent: April 8, 2014
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Kenneth A. Darby, Jason J. Kroh
  • Patent number: 8621536
    Abstract: The illustrative embodiments described herein provide systems and methods for conducting transactions with a customer using text messages. In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a first text message from a mobile communication device associated with a customer. The first text message includes a request from the customer to receive one or more text messages from a vendor. The method also includes adding the customer to a set of consenting customers in a customer database in response to receiving the first text message. The set of consenting customer including customers that consent to receiving text messages from the vendor. The method also includes sending a second text message to the mobile communication device. The second text message is associated with a service offered by the vendor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 18, 2010
    Date of Patent: December 31, 2013
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Chad David Hendren, Kenneth A Darby, James Frazer, Steven Gass, Sandra Stetich