The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent social, economic, geopolitical, and environmental challenges have led to unparalleled disruptions that present complex and interrelated threats to health and healthcare systems. However, these challenges have also fostered innovation in the healthcare system design and delivery in the recent years.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics projects a 13% growth in healthcare occupations from 2021 to 2031, which is significantly faster than the average for all occupations. This rapid growth is also accompanied by significant changes.
With the industry constantly evolving and healthcare organizations facing increasing pressure to operate more efficiently, it is crucial for them to have suitable processes and tools to support their operations. They must bring together stakeholders, industries, countries, and sectors to achieve a shared vision for health and healthcare.
Looking forward, the global healthcare IT market will be worth USD 974.5 billion by 2027. This is growth at a CAGR of 19.8% in the upcoming years.
Custom healthcare software is a critical element that enhances productivity and facilitates organizational adaptability and scalability. Custom software development companies offer services such as designing, creation, deployment, and maintenance of software for a specific group of users, functions, or organizations. Unlike commercial off-the-shelf software (COTS), custom software development caters to a precisely defined set of requirements. In contrast, COTS is designed to meet broader requirements, making it easier to pack and commercially market and distribute.
Developing custom healthcare software can offer numerous advantages for healthcare organizations. Healthcare providers can enhance patient care, boost efficiency, and lower costs. Here are some additional benefits associated with creating healthcare software.
The Benefits of Custom Healthcare Software
Technology provides extensive opportunities for customization in various fields such as patient portals and mobile health records. Considering the intricate nature of healthcare software development, hospitals may find custom software solutions more appealing. These solutions can be tailored to suit the specific requirements of healthcare organizations, ensuring user-friendliness and efficiency. Additionally, custom software can adapt and evolve along with the developing healthcare landscape, without causing any legal or technical challenges.
The effectiveness of custom healthcare software can be directly attributed to its targeted design. Its specific nature results in a smoother, user-friendly experience for the intended purpose. Here is a look at some additional advantages of customized software for healthcare:
Simplifying processes, making them error-free: The technology developments have enabled us to perform tasks more efficiently and accurately. By embracing digital transformation and investing in suitable solutions, you can bring about significant changes in your organization. This enables your employees to complete their tasks more easily and allow them to concentrate on more critical matters. Furthermore, having digital records can minimize the possibility of errors or incorrect reporting.
Customized solutions for specific requirements: Each healthcare organization has unique requirements that are distinct from other businesses. Consequently, most software solutions are not specifically designed for healthcare, which means they may lack critical features required by your organization or may not function properly within your particular type of facility. Developing a custom healthcare solution is an effective approach to addressing these issues and obtaining the necessary tools.
Staying compliant always: Ensuring compliance is crucial in the healthcare industry, but it is possible to create custom software solutions while adhering to regulations. For instance, if a project necessitates specific compliance, the development team can be made to undergo the necessary training to understand the compliance requirement. This allows them to better understand the obligations associated with accessing protected health information and ensure that compliance is built into the program.
Why is a Custom Development Team a Good Choice?
Customized healthcare software development is increasingly becoming a priority in the medical industry. In Deloitte’s 2022 Global Outsourcing Survey, over 76% of companies surveyed have their customized software development outsourced, rather than having it in-house. Here are the reasons why a custom development team is a good choice for healthcare organizations:
High levels of cost efficiency: Approximately 46% of startups fail due to financial issues, but the risk can be reduced by employing offshore developers. This approach avoids overhead costs such as payroll, office rent, insurance, and other expenses. These resources may be utilized for other important activities. Additionally, a team’s fees for designing websites or mobile applications are much less expensive compared to hiring an entire department and staff.
Access to skilled professionals: You have access to a diverse pool of professional healthcare software developers who are up to date with the latest technology. When you hire such personnel, you can overcome specialist shortages and benefit from a broader range of skills and expertise provided by a hired team of professionals.
Time to focus on core business processes: Without having to spend time refreshing or polishing your team’s skills, you can allocate your time and energy to activities that will genuinely contribute to the growth of your organization. When you employ a custom software development team with proven expertise in medical software development, they would not require any extensive training and briefing, as they are already proficient in their field. This allows you to concentrate on developing critical hospital resources.
Better productivity: Hiring a custom software development team can enhance your productivity in developing healthcare applications or building websites, ultimately saving you time. As these developers possess the required expertise, you do not have to spend additional time and resources on their training and skill development. This allows you to focus on HR-related activities and practices more efficiently.
The power of flexibility: Managing and scaling an in-house team can be complex, especially when it comes to making changes to the technology to enhance project scope. Software development services require a high degree of flexibility, which is difficult to achieve with an in-house team. In contrast, outsourced developers offer greater flexibility in terms of numbers and expertise. Therefore, you can select the ones that align best with your criteria and collaborate with them to achieve optimal results.
Solutions developed can be business-centric or patient-focused. Here is a look at some of the possible solutions.
Business-oriented Solutions
The goal of custom software development is to enhance the workflow for medical services and healthcare professionals. There are several business-oriented software varieties available, including:
Electronic health record (EHR) software: EHR software refers to a digital folder that collects patient information including the medical history, to minimize paperwork for physicians and ensure secure storage. It offers various features including decision-making assistance, medical data storage and administration, and customized templates intended for specific needs. By accelerating the EHR workflow, it helps medical practices provide better services to the patients.
Hospital management software: Hospital management software comprises an integrated system that aids the hospital administration and medical staff in their day-to-day tasks. It helps to plan and implement policies, assure interaction and coordination among employees, automate everyday tasks, create patient-centric workflows, promote services, handle financial and human resources, and offer an incessant supply chain. It often synchronizes with EHR solutions to track patient records and ensure that quality standards and industry norms are met with.
Medical imaging software: Medical imaging software provides diagnostic information for conditions such as neurological and gynecological disorders, cancer, and cardiovascular diseases. Specific software helps medical workers manage CT/MRI/PET scans efficiently and develop real-time 3D image models of different organs and body systems. The market size of medical imaging analytics software is expected to exceed $4.2 billion by 2025, and with the addition of technologies such as Machine Learning, Deep Learning, and AI, it will significantly enhance doctors’ expertise.
Medical diagnosis software: Medical diagnosis software enables doctors to identify symptoms and generate correct diagnoses in real time. It uses AI writing tools to analyze data and generate appropriate diagnoses and solutions. During the pandemic, medical diagnosis software became relevant for both patients and medical workers, allowing the former to check their symptoms remotely and the latter to put diagnoses and track disease progression.
Medical billing software: Medical billing software automates billing processes and tracks financial operations including invoicing, insurance claims, patient eligibility verification, and more. It reduces physical errors while transferring personal data between systems, ensuring transparent and secure transactions.
Custom Software Benefits for Health Organizations and Medical Professionals
Integrating different types of software allows medical facilities and staff to maximize the benefits of custom medical software and improve their expertise in the healthcare industry. Such a software offers various advantages including reducing routine paperwork, facilitating efficient management processes, improving treatment through early detection of diseases, enhancing communication among medical workers, providing real-time access to data, automating day-to-day tasks, and minimizing manual errors and operational costs.
Patient-centric solutions: Patient-focused solutions are designed to simplify and improve interactions between patients and healthcare institutions. By using such software, patients no longer need to carry physical health cards, wait in long lines, and schedule appointments over the phone.
Telemedicine software: This allows patients to receive medical treatment online, making it convenient, accessible, and efficient. Its popularity has surged in recent years, especially since the COVID-19 outbreak. More and more patients prefer to have online consultations. Telemedicine software allows patients to communicate with their doctors online using various communication methods such as calls, video conferencing, and chats, using different devices like mobile phones, computers, and tablets.
Such telemedicine platforms can be used by both doctors and patients to:
- Determine if the patient needs to visit in person.
- Provide specific medical care such as mental health treatment and minor infection assessments.
- Renew or prescribe medication.
- Offer specific therapies such as speech or physical rehabilitation.
Personal health record software: This is one of the most effective ways for patients to stay involved and manage their ongoing medical care. Personal health records are digital data that includes a detailed history of procedures and medical conditions, medications, allergies, and immunizations. An individual’s entire medical information or a family’s medical data is stored in one place and can be accessed instantly from any device.
Personal health record software can be integrated with physicians’ or hospitals’ electronic health record systems and can function similarly to a patient portal. Patients can:
- Monitor and assess their health by recording and tracking progress toward their health objectives.
- Plan for doctor appointments by preparing a list of questions or obtaining information such as a blood sugar diary, before their visit.
- Track their state of health between appointments by uploading and analyzing data from home-monitoring devices such as blood pressure cuffs.
- Stay organized by keeping track of appointments, vaccinations, medications, and preventative or screening services.
E-prescribing software: This makes it simpler for doctors to manage medication prescriptions for their patients. They can track and renew dosages or cancel prescriptions online. Additionally, it is integrated into various reference databases so that doctors can add or remove drugs from their patients’ lists.
All prescribed medicines are included in the patient’s electronic health record, and other healthcare professionals who take over the patient’s care will be able to view the entire course of medical treatment.
Appointment scheduling software: This is a specialized software that automates the process of scheduling patient appointments in medical facilities. A tool within this software aids in the coordination of calendar appointments and helps confirm all available time slots.
A medical scheduling solution can offer several benefits to both patients and healthcare professionals such as time savings. Patients no longer have to spend time coordinating appointments with office staff; instead, they can focus on more important tasks. Additionally, the appointment reminder feature in most medical scheduling systems can help patients remember their appointments, leading to decrease in the number of missed appointments. By eliminating the need for patients to wait in a queue, scheduling software can significantly reduce the time spent on waiting. Medical scheduling software works to ensure a price-friendly, comprehensive solution that removes the need for expensive servers, networking, and software. A more efficient and streamlined appointment scheduling process can lead to a better patient experience with fewer steps and less hassle, which can positively impact patient satisfaction.
Custom medical software implementation is beneficial not only for hospitals and medical workers, but also for patients. It enhances the quality of services provided to patients during their interactions with medical institutions, leaving them with a positive impression.
Other benefits for patients include:
- A user-friendly system for appointment scheduling.
- Quick remote communication between physicians and patients via any device.
- Easy access to all health records and reports from medical examinations with a single click.
- Access and control of prescriptions and the ability to manage treatment from any location.
Conclusion
Across the board, medical organizations are utilizing the power of custom healthcare software. This is a natural progression considering the several benefits digitalization ensures to healthcare institutions, health workers, and patients.
A custom development team helps medical companies and institutions create customized healthcare software that facilitates the easy harnessing of technology. It is also the path to remaining competitive and providing the best to patients while creating a healthy work atmosphere for medical professionals. The expertise of custom development team in the healthcare industry helps with constant improvement while adapting and customizing solutions for a client.
