8 Step Conclusive Guide Healthcare App Development 2022
Like most other industries, healthcare has changed dramatically due to advances in technology. The growing use of medical and health applications has opened up new avenues for the healthcare app development industry and is now taking a big leap when we are talking!
Healthcare applications have been very beneficial for both patients and healthcare professionals. This application connects doctors with patients who need help, which reduces the burden on healthcare workers.
They also allow healthcare professionals to learn about their patient’s symptoms and provide digital descriptions (if required). Healthcare applications enable better and faster diagnosis, thus improving overall patient care.
In short, mobile app development for healthcare is an extraordinary way to simplify the lives of patients and doctors, with a range of improvements that apps can bring to medical services.
In this Healthcare Application Development Guide, we will discuss how such applications are designed and define their benefits for the industry. We will also shed some light on the average cost of healthcare application development and its factors.
But before we dive into building a healthcare app, let’s take a look at the current state of the healthcare market.
What is Healthcare App Development?
Healthcare app development is the process of creating an app for mobile devices that allows its users to successfully submit and follow up on their health issues in real-time. For example, medical services, hospital experience, electronic health records or insurance claims.
Healthcare mobile application development works for a variety of purposes.
For doctors- The doctor’s application will assist the patient in tracking and monitoring, appointment scheduling and staff management.
For patients- Patients need digital health solutions to book appointments or on-demand healthcare apps, chat with their doctors or get recommendations.
Many digital health care and medical apps are available today, depending on the purpose and functionality. You must determine the type of app to estimate the accurate Healthcare App Development Cost after discussing with the developers.
Healthcare app development guide
For every healthcare executive interested in developing your first mobile app, we cover the top 9 things you need to know before signing on the dotted line to build your first app with this guide.
Define a Strong Digital Strategy
Specify the type of mobile healthcare app you are building. And why! Before anything else, you need to define a specific goal for your first health application. Don’t try to do it all. Also, think about what the app is for.
Here’s what all the best mobile apps have to offer. You can go to Facebook to decompress and see what your friends are up to, LinkedIn to read business news and network updates, apps to get medical help, etc. In the user’s mind, a connection is made between the mobile application and the specific use case.
Create a design
The design plays a major role in the app’s success, and the creation of the mHealth app should be consistent and intuitive. The goal is to get the user to the endpoint easily. The design should be user-friendly, and the fewer points of interaction on it, the better the user experience. Also, developers recommend minimizing the cognitive load of your application.
Make it HIPAA compliant
The developers can’t stress enough that the subject of healthcare is very sensitive, and healthcare application development is not easy. If you are thinking of creating a healthcare app, there are some rules to follow.
For example, the USA region will require your application to comply with HIPAA rules. In Europe, all applications processing personal information must comply with the GDPR.
The idea of HIPAA is to ensure the security of personal health information for both parties: patients and healthcare providers. How to make sure your application meets HIPAA requirements? That’s a nice question to ask, and here’s a little checklist that will help you.
Create MVP
Now that you have secured the use of secure services and selected the type of healthcare application, the next step should be MVP development. When creating a healthcare app MVP, you need to keep in mind the basic rules of creating an MVP: build it quickly and enable it.
Before developing a healthcare app MVP, you need to prioritize critical features, make sure they solve the problem and keep repeating. MVP gives you a competitive advantage because you quickly build a complete product rather than enter the market and start collecting feedback from real users.
Add intuitive features
The healthcare application is used by patients or people, in general, to maintain their health and stay up to date with healthy lifestyle trends. The key features to ensure when developing a health care application for patients are:
- Schedule an appointment: Facilitate the doctor to select for consultation, schedule an appointment and get confirmation as per their requirement.
- Reminders: These can be reminders about appointments, pills to take or even customized reminders for patient water intake, exercise time etc.
- Monitoring: The patient’s app should have a provision to track important signals such as blood pressure, pulse, blood sugar level etc.
- Chats: This is a useful feature that allows patients to get timely help from doctors.
- Feedback: Providing patients with the opportunity to share their counselling experience can benefit other patients to use the app to select the best doctors for their needs.
- Location Integration: Integrating locations into the Patient App will help patients find nearby hospitals or clinics in an emergency.
- Payment: Provision of cost to patients through secure and secure payment gateway for admission bills, medical bills, insurance etc.
Study your competitors
There will be other players in the market who offer the same healthcare as you. You should analyse these competitors to find market presence, stocks, strengths and weaknesses. This will help you to refine your ideas about the application as well as to understand the marketing strategies.
Each product must have a unique selling point (USP) that sets them apart from their competitors. You should study the USP of your competitors, understand the market reaction and come up with a unique perspective that only your application can provide.
Determine tools and techniques
On what technology will your app be built – Android, iOS or both? Do you have an omni-channel strategy? Does your app need integration with camera, GPS or voice recorder?
To answer all of this, you need to look at your target audience. Their age, gender, geographical location helps to determine these factors. For example, people in the United States and China are mostly iOS users, while countries like India and the UK have more Android users.
Also, if your app targets a small audience, a mobile app will suffice, but an older audience will prefer a website or tablet. Planning ahead will help you improve your healthcare app development journey.
Plan your monetization approach
Before you design or develop your app, you need to plan your monetization strategy. In general, applications that serve as an additional solution for medical institutions do not use the same monetization strategy. However, if your application is an independent solution, you will need to look at how to make a profit from it.
Most popular mHealth apps are free apps. These apps make a profit by advertising or subscribing to premium services. Apps that use in-app purchasing strategies are often not easily accepted by the audience. Some apps adopt a strategy where they offer a free trial for a month and then start offering paid services. Choose the approach that works best for you and your audience.
Final thoughts
If you have for building a telemedicine application, be prepared for some challenges with user research and data security. It can be difficult to visit your potential customers when dealing with sensitive topics.
Try to follow developers’ advice when asking about the method instead of individual issues, which will simplify the research phase. Also, note that your application must be HIPAA-compliant and comply with all required rules. Otherwise, you run the risk of being punished.
