Healthcare app development for digital transformation

HIPAA, or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, is a federal law that imposes national standards to protect the privacy and security of personal health information (PHI) across the United States. Being HIPAA compliant means you ensure the confidentiality of private patient information in all its forms (oral, paper, and electronic). You need to comply with HIPAA if your healthcare app is for or used by:

• healthcare providers (hospitals, clinics, doctors, and nursing homes)

• health plans (insurance companies, HMOs, and other government programs, for example, Medicare)

• healthcare clearinghouses (the middleman between providers and insurance companies that help process insurance claims).

These regulations do not apply to health service organizations that are not subject to U.S. law. At the same time, even if you are targeting only markets outside of the U.S., you might still be required to be HIPAA compliant if you process the health information of U.S. citizens that live in other countries. Being compliant with HIPAA will keep you away from fines and, at the same time, can be a benefit as your app might expand or process patient data from the U.S.

The development process’ length varies greatly depending on how complex the application is, the tech stack you plan on using, and what features you want to include. Additionally, the number of people in your development teams is also a factor. You can always contact us for a free consultation to get a rough estimate of the time necessary.

The healthcare app development cost can vary between $24,000 to $137,000, depending on the complexity and features included. The estimation formula is simple: total development time (hours) multiplied by the hourly rate. However, for more details on the cost of developing your customized healthcare app, you can check our estimation guide or request a rough estimation specifically for your application.

Before you move along with app development in the healthcare industry, you should have a clear idea of who you want to build an app for and the reasons why. What goals do you have, and what makes your development solution unique? After you have that figured out, here are a couple of points that you need to establish:

• What tech stack do you want to use

• How will you store data securely, according to all regulations in place

• The management of administrative privileges

Even though every use case is different, there are a couple of common mistakes that can prevent you from developing a successful healthcare app and have an impact on patient experience:

• Losing sight of who the end user is and what they want to use

• Overcomplicating your app

• Losing sight of your objectives and goals

• Forgetting about compliance

• Not planning for the future

If we look back a few years, we can see that the healthcare industry has faced unprecedented challenges and has had to adapt. Healthcare software development was one of the answers - a source of innovative solutions that streamlines some healthcare business processes.

You might want to create a healthcare application if you want:

• Better management of health data

• Remote patient monitoring

• Lower expenses for both healthcare providers and patients

• Better communication between patients and healthcare professionals

• Increased customer loyalty and engaged patients

• Better practice management

• Easier patient health monitoring

• Improved patient experience

The idea of the perfect healthcare application differs from one user to another. Still, there are some common features most healthcare solutions should have (depending on their purpose), including, but not limited to:

• Patients data collection

• Networking for healthcare professionals

• Appointment schedules

• Seamless registration and login

• Doctor and patient profiles

• Reminders and notifications

• Medical devices integration

• Medical records access

• Health data protection

There is more than one type of healthcare app out there, but only a few have managed to keep their patients engaged.. And unsurprisingly, most of these medical applications have a couple of things in common:

• Customized healthcare updates

• Prescription management system

• Remote patient monitoring

• Easy communication between patients and doctors

• Artificial intelligence chat-bots