As healthcare software development has drastically been increasing following an equal rise in demand, clinical practices the world over have been busy trying to treat vast numbers of patients, while keeping costs at a minimum. The industry of software outsourcing in Asia, while being at the forefront of developing software across numerous industries, has also seen a subsequent rise in demand for healthcare software development. Thanks to a steady and comprehensive establishment of AWS services in Asia, software companies in the region have been able to adapt to rapid changes and deliver scalable software products for their clientele.
As a software company in Sri Lanka, EFutures has always been dedicated to providing applications that can enable clients to reach their business objectives, irrespective of how unique they may be. Actively being in the market for software development in Asia, we also aim to be front and centre of the latest trends and learn how these can be applied to real-life applications for our clientele.
With the healthcare industry experiencing massive boons since 2020, businesses have had to innovate (and very quickly, at that) – else risk losing out to the competition. As smaller, boutique businesses also entered the industry to offer services such as telemedicine on a mass scale with intuitive mobile apps, larger practices were certainly made to feel some competition, in spite of having sufficient patients to treat and with business going on as usual.
Add to this other concept such as nutrition and wellness apps; as consumers continue to be inundated with options on how to take better care of their health, the healthcare industry at large has drastically evolved to go beyond conventional clinics, hospitals, and related establishments. Nonetheless, healthcare businesses still remain at the top for facilitating reliable medical treatment. With the advent of cloud computing, implementing or integrating the various applications that can enable healthcare businesses to function smoothly has been made all the more easy, accessible, and affordable.
Medical practice management systems form the foundation of healthcare establishments today, as they provide all the general functionalities to power administration and task management in clinics and hospitals. Basic features include patient appointment and referral management, along with other components such as treatment planning, transition care management and patient education tools.
EMR and EHR systems both organise and display patient information in a single profile, but are different in a number of key ways. EMR systems only focus on one patient at a time and are confined to the clinic or hospital that created it. EHR on the other hand features a collection of patient health data across a single profile, which is shareable between healthcare providers.
Medical billing and RCM solutions are crucial components for any healthcare establishment, as they ensure payments flow between hospitals/clinics, patients, and insurance providers in an accurate and timely manner. While medical billing focuses on obtaining payment from patients and filing insurance claims correctly, RCM offers extended capabilities that also drive insightful reports from financial data.
Medical imaging software provides the capabilities necessary to execute diagnostics such as x-rays and MRI scans. The latest solutions also offer 3D imaging capabilities, so healthcare practitioners can get a clearer view of results to aid successive treatments. Thanks to its 3D capabilities, medical imaging software is now also used to design devices such as prosthetic limbs.
Laboratory management software enables laboratory technicians to organise test appointments, manage samples and even integrate testing equipment to automatically process samples. Laboratory Information Management Systems (LIMS) are generally part of overarching laboratory management software, as data can be collected, stored, and managed for the purpose of revealing valuable insights via reporting and analytics tools.
Medical research software enables researchers to organise clinical trials as well as their findings, all within one comprehensive system. By integrating other applications such as laboratory management, medical researchers can benefit from a continuous stream of data that can further help with identifying patterns and possibly even predicting trends (especially if AI and machine learning is used).
Pharmacy management software offers inventory capabilities that can enable technicians to keep track of every single item in store, along with automatically replenishing stocks once they dwindle down to a certain threshold. Additionally, pharmacy management software works closely with e-prescriptions, helping clinicians administer medications to patients without any manual intervention.
Pharmacy management and e-prescription systems have also become key components for mobile apps that offer customers the ability to order medicines with a few taps and have them contactless delivered to their doorsteps.
Telemedicine software offers clinicians the convenience to consult patients remotely. Usually featured as a mobile app, telemedicine software provides patients the ability to book appointments online, and consult doctors as per their convenience. While this offers patients the advantage to consult doctors at any time and from anywhere, it also reduces the number of patients that healthcare administrators need to handle during in-person appointments – especially for minor ailments that can otherwise be resolved over a quick video call.
Before building any software application, it is important to first understand the problems being faced by your organisation in a detailed and insightful manner. This is possible by gathering relevant members of your team to discuss the problems, bottlenecks, and silos that each team member/department experiences, and how these issues are impediments to the duties they need to fulfil.
Next, gathering these notes into a brief and sharing this with your development team will serve as the primary point of reference for the calibre of software that your business deserves, in order to meet its goals.
After sharing the business assessment, you built with your development team, offering them a detailed verbal brief on the same can also help them get a clear idea of what your business problems are – and how they can be solved with the right applications and infrastructure. Your business assessment can also help foster productive conversations that encourage insightful questions, and clear any doubts that development teams may have.
Following the information gathering stage, the onus is on development teams to ensure the right software architecture is built to sustain a healthcare application that can meet current requirements while being scalable enough to adapt in the future as needed. As the software development project progresses, business leaders and product owners can keep an eye on the features being released in the first iteration, so nothing important is missing.
However, pulling the reins on supplementary/secondary features is good practice for Minimum Viable Products (MVPs). This way, only the most essential capabilities are released during the first iteration. As teams collaborate on software development over an extended period of time, it is easy for features that are otherwise not essential to make it into the roadmap. But always taking time to distinguish between essential and non-essential features can help teams build a product that is less cluttered, has a smaller learning curve, and can be deployed faster.
With an MVP only consisting of the bare essentials, users can then test the product to offer development teams their honest feedback. During the next iteration, new capabilities can be added based on this feedback, thereby making MVPs a great starting point for building a healthcare application that only has features that are reliable and useful.
Healthcare software development is an industry that merits its own set of discussion points, simply owing to how vast and intricate it is. With healthcare businesses now dealing with unprecedented demand from patients, clinics and hospitals today need to scale fast, while keeping costs at a minimum and ensuring staff stays productive. What’s more, concepts such as wellness apps have also proliferated in the overarching healthcare marketplace, thereby creating much variety for consumers to embark on alternative modes toward a healthier lifestyle.
As a result, healthcare establishments need to constantly be at the top of providing services to patients in a convenient and timely manner. By building custom healthcare software, multi-chain hospitals and family-owned clinics alike can ensure their patients get the treatment they need while freeing staff up from repetitive tasks to instead focus their attention where it’s needed most. Custom healthcare software development can include different types of healthcare software modules, either as part of one holistic solution or as integration between numerous third-party vendors.
Building a business assessment, collaborating closely with your software development team, and focusing on releasing only essential features via an MVP can gear healthcare businesses with the custom applications they need to facilitate medical treatment to their patients, while maximising revenue and slashing costs at the same time.