The Ultimate Guide on Telemedicine App Development

Medications play an essential role in maintaining our overall well-being right now. Consequently, it will be a good idea to keep track of what medicines we use. On the other hand, you might be feeling unwell on some occasions, and in that case, what can be your right solution? This will be exactly where telemedicine apps will prove to be beneficial for you.

Similar to most of the other apps on the market, telemedicine apps are likewise quite popular at present. It will help the patients and the medical practitioners to communicate with one another easily while the treatment is going on. Moreover, there is no need for any private space for physicians to treat patients. In a particular survey, it was predicted that the size of the telemedicine market will increase to as much as $42 billion by 2022.

In the subsequent paragraphs, we have mentioned the benefits, types, challenges, and costs of developing telemedicine apps.

Benefits of developing Telemedicine Apps

1. Extensive availability

According to a recent study, it was confirmed that there is a deficit of an adequate number of healthcare personnel out there. For example, there are only 40 doctors in rural areas and 55 physicians in the urban areas every 100,000 individuals. However, it is feasible for the doctors to help the patients in those areas which don’t have access to decent medical care these days. This is due to the emergence of telemedicine apps that aid in saving more lives in the long run.

2. Reduced healthcare expenses

There is no need for companies to hire a working space while rendering healthcare services remotely. In this way, it is now possible for an increasing number of medical practitioners to extend their services. In addition, they can make use of the telemedicine apps for working independently.

Telemedicine app development does not help self-employed physicians only. They likewise help the clinics get more customers since the patients don’t need to stand in long queues to gain healthcare services. In this way, the hospitals can generate more revenues within a short period.

3. Time-efficient treatment

In a particular healthcare clinic, while some physicians might be working, others might enjoy a day off. Moreover, lots of time might be spent on the commute when it comes to complicated health screening. On the other hand, telemedicine apps will help any individual reduce the time spent on healthcare services by around 55%.

4. Maintaining medical records

It is extremely important to maintain medical records while providing treatment to patients. Telemedicine apps help to facilitate the process of keeping medical records. The doctors will be capable of sharing the patients’ information for treating them in a better way.

5. Effective time management

It has been found by research that approximately 15% of the patients are struggling with depressive disorders. It will be possible for the physicians and the hospital staff to manage their time effectively with the help of telemedicine apps. Doctors are not going to miss any appointments, thanks to the introduction of the in-app schedule plus push notifications.

The companies will be capable of syncing their CRMs with the application by making use of telemedicine apps. In this way, these apps will offer extended functionality to physicians as well as the staff. For example, the administration can monitor the workload of the doctors to maintain their work-life balance. Furthermore, it will be possible for medical practitioners to apply for shift changes and sick days using the app.

Must Read: Top Reasons Why Healthcare Mobile App is so Important Today

Different types of Telemedicine Apps

It will be possible for you to choose from different telemedicine types depending on the requirements of the patients.

• Real-time telemedicine – Also referred to as live telemedicine, this type of telemedicine app helps make a doctor-patient visit quite convenient anytime, irrespective of the location. Patients will be able to interact in real-time with the help of phone consultations and video conferencing. In addition, it will be feasible to perform basic examinations, assessment of medical records, psychiatric evaluations, and so on with the help of real-time telemedicine.

• Interactive telemedicine – Simply speaking, this type of solution will enable any doctor to provide treatments to the patients remotely with the help of a video or audio consultation. Interactive telemedicine apps will be ideal for mental therapies such as CBT, post-injury monitoring, and nursing consultation.

• Remote patient monitoring – This type of telemedicine app will allow any physician to observe the health condition of their patients from a remote distance while he or she is in their residence. In this way, there will be a significant reduction in the time spent by the patients in the hospital. On the other hand, they will be capable of recovering while getting treated at their own houses. This will be appropriate right now, given that the world is under the threat of coronavirus right now.

• Store-and-forward – Here, the physician will be able to gain access to the patients’ medical records from a remote location. The delivering and the receiving parties don’t need to interact concurrently while taking advantage of the store-and-forward telemedicine app. Instead, the data can be collected by an expert or a field technician who will be uploading it to be inspected by one more expert afterward.

Challenges associated with Telemedicine App Development

As mentioned earlier, interacting with the patients and the healthcare organizations has made it quite easy to get proper treatment right now. Nevertheless, it is somewhat challenging to get the job done securely. Despite having lots of advantages, the healthcare industry must overcome these challenges. Below, we have highlighted several of these obstacles faced by the healthcare industry at present.

1. Security and compliance

There is always a movement of health data between the medical experts and the patients. In this way, there has been an increased risk of broken authentication and cross-site scripting. There is also a high possibility of the misuse of confidential data.

A telemedicine application development project must emphasize compliance. While creating a HIPAA compliant application, one has to consider the subsequent aspects:

• Usage of authenticated API frameworks only

• Usage of a reliable HIPAA-compliant data storage solution such as AWS

• Making use of multi-device permission

• Using biometrics for accessing apps

• Making use of libraries having the most recent security updates

It is vital for telemedicine app development projects to consider all the medical standards and applicable regulatory specifications. The job of a web app is to link the patients with the physicians out there. Consequently, it is important to stick to compliance very stringently for becoming functional and providing value.

2. Design and Development

One must consider several essential aspects such as navigation, logic, functionality, and layout while developing a mobile web app. Furthermore, one must likewise comprehend that there is a difference in the UX and UI of the telemedicine apps of the patient and the doctor. Therefore, it is essential to refer to the already established industry designs, go through telemedicine documents, and verify compatibility with your present systems upfront.

3. Licenses of the physicians

The license of physicians will allow them to provide treatments to patients within the state. However, things will be different if they want to render their services in a different state or country. In that case, it will be imperative for them to make an application for an appropriate license. However, this can prove to be expensive as well as time-consuming.

4. Development and training

The patients and clinicians must receive proper training, which can prove to be a significant challenge. This is because the healthcare providers will be required to bear an extra burden on their shoulders. They have to provide training for various users, which can be expensive in the long run. This problem can be fixed by designing proper training methods and formulating guidelines. A lot depends on the user experience of the developed platform for getting rid of a significant portion of this training burden.

5. Scalability

One important aspect of telemedicine app development is that it should not only be rich in innovative features but it should also be scalable. At present, there has been a lot of demand for telemedicine apps, particularly after the outburst of the pandemic. Consequently, it is essential to ensure that there is enough scalability to satisfy the demands out there.

How much is it going to cost to develop Telemedicine Apps?

Investing in telemedicine apps can prove to be a complicated decision for most mobile app development companies out there. There are various aspects on which the development of telemedicine apps depends. These can be the timeline, the complexity of the features, the targeted platforms, API integration, technical skills of the developers, and so on. It is important to remember that the complexity of developing telemedicine apps is directly proportional to the expenses of developing these apps.

Conclusion

Healthcare companies need to invest in developing telemedicine apps if they want to remain updated and gratify their clients shortly. There will be an increasing demand for these types of applications, particularly after the pandemic outbreak. In a nutshell, it can be rightly asserted that telemedicine app development will allow healthcare organizations to take proper care of their patients.