There are many challenges that medical teams around the world must face in order to provide quality service. However, we can count on the evolution of medical studies and new tools. For example, the use of medical applications is already a reality in many places, including here in Brazil!
There are several existing models to achieve different objectives within patient care. With this, medicine becomes more capable of meeting the growing volume of people who need medical attention in any specialty. Above all, this type of technology stands out in places where resources are scarce.
For example, in rural towns where access to a hospital can take a long time and mobile services are not as efficient, apps can be crucial to increasing the quality of service. This is because they can work either as a way to monitor some patients, to schedule appointments, or to request urgent medical service.
Regardless of the purpose of creating medical applications, it is a fact that the development of specific software for doctors marks a major advance in medical care. For this reason, more and more professionals are requesting the creation of these applications.
Medical applications: telemedicine, mHealth, and mLearning
The use of apps for doctors has optimized care, making it faster and more efficient, in many places around the world. This is the pure expression that the future is already with us and will transform the lives of thousands of people.
All this by means of a type of technology that is more accessible to a large part of the population due to its relatively low cost. After all, there is a huge number of people in Brazil and in other countries who live with smartphones that have already become an indispensable part of their routine. Proof of this is that during the Covid-19 pandemic practically all public service was done by cell phone.
Including, it was in this historical moment that led medicine to seek new alternatives in the development of software that would supply, even minimally, the void that the pandemic left. In this context, the number of Telemedicine, mHealth, and mLearning tools is growing.
Telemedicine – What is it?
What is identified as “telemedicine” is simple patient care done by health professionals remotely. This type of resource was very present throughout the Covid 19 pandemic, when it was very difficult to leave home for any kind of situation, even more so with hospitals full.
For example, psychotherapy services via Skype or Zoom was a case of telemedicine that grew dramatically during the pandemic times. This provided relief to millions of people and managed to bring lives closer together through quality medical service and the available technology.
However, we know how flawed and inefficient telemedicine itself can be for many reasons. Still, it is an emergency resource at times and can help reduce the constant flow of patients in hospitals.
With the right technology, it is possible to provide competent remote care for less severe cases, as well as patient monitoring, prescription renewal, and more. In this sense, developing an application or software to enhance telemedicine will further cooperate with this offering.
mHealth – What is it?
Telemedicine and mHealth are often confused; however, they are different practices with different purposes, but they have one thing in common: the use of technology to improve the lives of patients. As we have already mentioned, telemedicine will work with remote medical care, with a predominance of video calls.
In the case of mHealth, on the other hand, there is mobile medical care, which has as its main goal is to reduce the demand for care in face-to-face hospitals. In other words, the focus is to optimize some of the services related to health care, so that the focus is actually on treating patients.
In a way, mHealth is already present in many people’s lives, being a reality in many contexts. For example, when someone uses a mobile application to make a doctor’s appointment, in any specialty, an mHealth process is taking place. As a result, people optimize their time and the demand in hospitals and clinics is reduced.
But that’s not all, since more and more researchers in the field of medicine and technology have been thinking about how to make this service more complete. Thus, we can find software and applications that are able to do triage via application, monitor patients who are far away, and even schedule surgeries.
There was also a significant increase in mHealth services during the Covid-19 pandemic, which helped in many contexts to not let healthcare go into total collapse due to excess demand.
mLearning – What is it?
Finally, we have another resource that also relates to the use of apps for physicians that has grown quite a bit in recent years. In this case, mLearning is seen as the future in the learning process of new professionals in medicine and related health fields, so much so that we already find it in universities, technical courses, and more.
It is, therefore, about mobile learning, with a focus on improving health professionals through efficient educational methods. As an example, we can cite quiz apps, where medical students have to answer questions every day to improve their knowledge.
In the long term, this can contribute greatly to making diagnoses in the office more efficient and increase the professional’s repertoire when dealing with a patient. As we mentioned, there are already medical schools that work directly with mLearning applications and software to train doctors.
Moreover, this will also be a resource available to those who have already graduated and are already practicing. After all, the learning process never really ends, while medicine itself is constantly changing with new discoveries and also new treatments.
We can think, then, that this is a good alternative to prevent doctors and health professionals from getting stuck in outdated methods. This with just a few minutes a day that are already able to transform knowledge and, consequently, improve the lives of patients.
For telemedicine, mHealth, and mLearning alike, there are many technological resources capable of taking these simple initiatives to a higher level of quality.
Why create a medical application for care?
So far we have already managed to understand some of the main advantages of using apps for physicians, but let’s summarize them in a way that will make it even more explicit. In the case, many health professionals, especially those who work autonomously, are in doubt if investing in an application really has its advantages.
Yes, there are, and we can cite several. Starting with the improvement in the quality of service, which will always be a point capable of generating competitive advantage. That is, with the improvement of the service that you produce, your reputation as a health professional will grow a lot in your area of care.
In addition, apps are also great for reducing the excessive workload that the doctor or health professional has. Usually there are many clinics to attend to in a short period of time, many patients, some of whom need to be monitored on a regular basis.
With this, small tasks that together take up a lot of time can be done more quickly, and consequently the professional can dedicate themselves to other tasks. For example, the appointment scheduling service can be done entirely by means of software that can organize the appointment times, the order of the patients, and their medical records.
In addition, prescription renewal itself can be requested via the application, patient reports, such as symptom identification, and more. Finally, patients can rate the service they have had, and this is a powerful feature to be able to map customer preferences.
In any case, it is always important to remember that access to technology is much more than financial advancement. This is because there will be a higher quality of life for the patients who have experienced this technology, as well as for the healthcare professional.
Types of Medical Apps – and how to make them
Now that you have identified how much medical services can improve with the use of apps, you have probably already decided to invest in this resource for your work. So now it’s time to think about what factors need to be present in an app for your patients.
In this context, it is important to think about each service in a specific way, i.e., to map which difficulties present in the daily professional life could be solved with a software system. From this, it is possible to resort to some special tools that programs and applications have to solve problems. Let’s look at some of them:
In-app chat
Nowadays, people are increasingly in a hurry to have accurate answers about their problems, especially when it comes to answering questions. In this sense, the telephone may not always be a good alternative, since it requires someone to be at the other end of the line listening to what the other is saying.
On the other hand, modern applications and software can already do a kind of self-service within the platform itself. For example, when someone sends a message on the app and an automatic message replies asking for more details about what the person wants.
Note that in this case there is a kind of service triage, so that the professional who will actually answer the question already has prior knowledge about the subject. Moreover, sometimes self-service is enough to solve the question.
After all, there are several people who have the same question, so that instead of stopping to answer the same thing all the time, the in-app chat could already register these answers and clarify the doubts.
User Flow
Apps and software for doctors are not exclusively for patients, as we already mentioned, because they also help the medical staff. Because of this, it is common for those looking to create an exclusive app to think about the possibility of creating two different platforms, but this is not necessary.
After all, through the User Flow features it is possible to create an app that has two or more versions, with areas for professionals and patients, for example. This makes the service much easier and can unify all demands in a single database with all possible convenience!
Push notifications
Not always doctors or patients can keep in mind the whole week’s agenda, which is common nowadays. But this problem can easily find the solution in a medical app, where there would be notifications about the appointments, need to do tests, time to take medicines, schedule revisions and much more.
In this case, “push notifications” is the mechanism in the apps that makes the notifications from an app appear on the home screen of the cell phone. Thus, even if the patient or doctor forgets to log in to the platform, the notice will be there a day before, for example, and this prevents the loss of time and money, such as missing appointments.
Payment gateway
Today virtually all bureaucratic processes can be solved by access to a smartphone, which is indeed a revolution. For example, more and more people are using applications for paying and generating bills, using credit cards, negotiating debts, and much more.
Moreover, these processes can be done with all the security of the existing state-of-the-art technology for this type of need. For the doctor or patient, the availability of payment via app can also be a great facility. After all, those who book an appointment will be able to pay directly through the app, before even going to the doctor’s office!
Digital prescriptions
Within this aspect, telemedicine is the most benefited, so that digital prescriptions were very common in the context of the pandemic. In this case, it is the issuing of prescriptions via app or digital platform, which makes it easier for a patient who needs continuous use medicines and cannot be always going to the doctor’s office.
This way, the entire renewal could happen via the Internet very conveniently and quickly. Thus, the doctor would handwrite the prescription, as required by law, and scan it to send the prescription directly to the patient.
This can also be done by e-mail, but this feature makes it easier to forge prescriptions. On the other hand, the physician could use an app that would guarantee single access to the prescription on the exclusive platform, so that the document would no longer be available after the single access for printing.
Evaluation and triage system
Finally, we have a resource that is also already very present in the daily lives of many people in Brazil and around the world. After all, the use of applications and software to screen for service is a reality in many places and for millions of people.
Thus, the main advantage would be the optimization of medical care, with shorter queues and priority for patients in severe and urgent cases. When we talk about “evaluation”, we are referring both to the use of the app to issue a possible diagnosis and save it in a kind of “digital medical record” and to the evaluation of patients.
Conclusion
Technology in medical care in clinics and hospitals is a resource of the future that has arrived and is among us! Therefore, it will be increasingly possible to find it in any service station, both in the public and private sector. However, those who come out ahead and equip their offices will stand out the most.
Therefore, be sure to consider creating an online service for your medical service as soon as possible, for all the reasons we have already mentioned in this text. Those who opt for this feature experience an increase in positive job ratings, which results in a competitive advantage.
Furthermore, patients will be able to experience the best of medicine without all the obstacles that have prevailed until now, such as delays and bureaucracy. Therefore, it is not an expense, but an investment with the possibility of a much higher return than the initial amount.
To help you in this mission, Monitora counts on the best professionals in the development and technology areas, with squads prepared to develop the best software your office needs. So, don’t waste time and get to know a little more about our work and contact us!
