In the past couple of years, telemedicine has exploded in popularity and adoption. But patients and providers are reaping huge benefits by being able to provide remote medical care using telecommunications technology. But, to develop and market a telemedicine application, you need to plan and think carefully in order to guide the application to success.
Understanding Telemedicine and Its Growing Importance
Telemedicine is technology based health care delivery of medical information from one place to another. Telehealth app development enables patients to talk to their doctors through real time video conferencing and document sharing for remote consultations, evaluations, and therapy.
The COVID-19 pandemic sharply increased the demand for telemedicine capabilities. Telehealth visits in the United States alone went from around 1 million in 2019 to close to 1 billion in 2022. Patients appreciated the safety and convenience while providers reached more people. This growth is expected to continue as telemedicine becomes normalized in health care.
Developing telemedicine apps on your own or with the help of telemedicine app development services is important for improving access to care, reducing costs, and enhancing services. However, the right foundational choices must be made early for effective promotion and adoption.
Choosing the Right Telemedicine Application Type
When developing a telemedicine app, properly evaluating the intended use case and audience is critical for maximizing value. The major telemedicine app types include:
Patient-Provider Platforms
The platforms connect individual patients to healthcare provider for on demand virtual visits. Appointment scheduling, video calls, file sharing, payment are the features.
Enterprise Telehealth Solutions
Robust tools to help hospitals and health systems provide telemedicine services to their entire provider network and patient population. Features may be more complex and include EHR integrations, analytics, device connectivity, and coordination workflows.
Specialist Online Portals
Enabling teleconsults with specialists such as dermatologists, psychiatrists or dietitians on narrower platforms. The features are designed to address the types of exams, questionnaires, educational resources and care protocols relevant to this exam.
Remote Patient Monitoring Apps
RPM apps use connected health devices and dashboards to remotely track vital signs, chronic conditions and overall wellness between visits. They can intervene early before conditions worsen.
Carefully evaluating the patient experience you want to enable and the provider workflows you need to support will guide the right platform direction.
Selecting the Best Telemedicine Software Stack: How to Develop a Telemedicine App
The software technology choices will critically impact telemedicine app capabilities, interoperability, scalability, and cost.
Telemedicine App Development Platforms
Specialized telehealth platforms like SimplePractice, Doxy.me, or Teladoc provide turnkey solutions to build fully functional telemedicine apps for enterprise or independent use. They remove heavy lifting but limit customization.
Custom Telemedicine App Development
For ultimate flexibility and innovation, custom telemedicine apps are built from the ground up with modern web and mobile frameworks like ReactJS, Python, Swift, etc. However, this requires more effort and technical resources.
Interoperability with mainstream EHR/EMR systems is also key for usable provider workflows. APIs can connect telemedicine apps with major platforms like Epic, Cerner, Allscripts, etc. for data sharing.
Medical device integration may also be necessary for specialized use cases like remote patient monitoring. Choosing the right telemedicine mobile app development stack is critical.
Crafting an Intuitive and Compliant User Experience
Telemedicine platform development must be easy to use for both patients and providers, and at the same time should inspire confidence and trust.
Users can quickly find key features through simple and consistent navigation. They are also taken through the first-time onboarding process and visited step by step.
Provider credentials visibility helps to improve care quality. Sensitive data is protected with secure access controls, HIPAA compliant messaging, and EHR integration, while still allowing for information sharing.
The UX is optimized for friction removal and professionalism, leading to steady adoption.
Evaluating Telemedicine App Security and Compliance Requirements
Telemedicine apps must adhere to strict laws and regulations regarding health data security, privacy, and consent.
- HIPAA compliance is mandatory in the US, while GDPR governs EU data practices.
- End-to-end encryption with access controls secures data and messages.
- Patient consent flows control data sharing with other providers.
- Backup systems prevent data loss and ensure continuity of care if issues emerge.
Staying updated on the regulatory environment and making continual security investments is essential.
Launching an Effective Go-To-Market Strategy
Developing an innovative telemedicine app isn’t enough. Driving awareness and user activation after launch is crucial and an effective go to market strategy is key.
Craft Targeted Marketing Messages
Use these sites, collateral and campaigns to clarify and communicate your unique value proposition to your target patient and provider segments.
Leverage Provider Partnerships
Instantly scaling reach onboarding enterprise health system partners with existing patient bases. Drive engagement with white-labeled telemedicine solutions or revenue-sharing incentives.
Reduce Barriers to Entry
Patients and providers should be able to get started using the platform right away with self-sign-up options, as opposed to long, complicated onboarding processes. Hook interest with free trial periods.
Activate Patient and Provider Referrals
Referral programs, reviews/testimonials, and ratings incentivize happy users to organically recommend and share within their networks once they experience the benefits. Viral word-of-mouth fuels growth.
Launching with an aligned go-to-market strategy makes all the difference in driving adoption and ROI.
Key Takeaways on Telemedicine Application Development
With careful planning and execution across technology, design, security, and promotion – new telemedicine apps can successfully activate and scale. Key takeaways include:
- Guide platform direction and feature by evaluating the specific telehealth use case and audience.
- Decide on the right software stack for capabilities, scalability and cost management.
- Create the perfect, compliant user experience to engage.
- Keep up to date with healthcare regulations and maintain updated security and compliance.
- Get launched with a targeted go-to-market strategy to incentivize referrals and organic growth.
The telemedicine app ecosystem still has abundant white space for new solutions as adoption continues to rise. Following this telemedicine app development guide will set any new telemedicine application on the path to meaningful impact and success over the long term.
