Top Digital Health Trends in Mobile App Development for Healthcare

Did you know there are as many as 54546 and 41517 healthcare applications available on Google Play Store and App Store, respectively?

This might give you an idea of where the healthcare landscape is heading. As the awareness about health and healthy lifestyles is increasing, the resemblance of healthcare services on mobile devices will become even more prominent. As the demand for mobile health solutions or mHealth applications are increasing from both providers and patients, it can be argued that mHealth will make a significant portion of the future landscape.

To give you a nudge in the direction of the mobile health solutions, 30% of the population in the United States are active users of mHealth applications. And on a broader perspective 63.4% of US adults use mobile health solutions on a monthly basis to keep their health in check.

With thousands of healthcare mobile application coming in every year, the demand for a smooth user interface and user friendly application is steadily increasing. Along with that, providers are taking in mobile healthcare application development to make healthcare services accessible to everyone.

Mobile healthcare applications are not only looked at as a way to close the accessibility gaps in care delivery but also said to be the future of the healthcare industry moving ahead with technological advancements in the healthcare industry. However the current landscape is quite tricky and with a lot of things to consider while mobile app development for healthcare.

In this blog, let’s navigate through the current landscape of mobile health solutions and understand important things that should be considered in mobile app development for healthcare.

Top Digital Health Trends Shaping mHealth

Prolonged digital health trends become the norm and shape the future. With the introduction of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning, their use in health tech apps for various purposes is reportedly increasing. For instance, there are some healthcare applications that help healthcare providers with accurate diagnostics to provide personalized care in a better scope.

Along with that, AI-powered chatbots are also being used by many healthcare institutions in their custom healthcare software to further close the gap between patients and care services for minor issues.

Interestingly, the rise of mobile health solutions is bound to grow as wearable devices are becoming more relevant in people’s lives. These devices are integrated with mHealth apps that enable patients to keep a track and monitor their health on a day-to-day basis.

Furthermore, almost four in every five people have already used telehealth platforms. Brining this trend on mobile devices, there is a surge in the telehealth and telemedicine functionalities within health tech apps. Its integration will not only help in increasing accessibility for healthcare services for remote and underserved populations but also prove to be a cost saving venture for everyone involved in healthcare delivery.

Amidst all these digital health trends one of the most crucial trends that has become the backbone of these mHealth apps is the data security and user privacy. Since mobile phones are always prone to cyber attacks it is important for mobile health app developers to take robust security and privacy to ensure data safety and practice integrity.

Key Considerations for Development

While healthcare mobile apps have gained momentum and are one of the most popular trends in the current healthcare landscape, there are certain things that one should consider for ideal development of mobile healthcare applications.

Here are some of the things that you must consider in healthcare mobile application development:

1. Know Your User: Healthcare is a vast field, you can literally create a mobile application for every part of the human body. Though it is a far fetched dream, understanding your target audience and their specific needs can help you enter one particular niche and provide optimum services to patients.

2. Design and User Experience: Another aspect of a healthcare mobile app is the design and user interface that your application provides. The application should be able to easily navigate the user through their entire care journey and provide a seamless, intuitive, and interactive user experience.

3. Compliance and Regulations: Since the healthcare mobile app that you’re developing will deal with one of the most sensitive information about a person’s health, failing to safeguard it can put the person’s fundamental rights at risk. That is the reason you must abide by regulatory compliance to maintain the integrity and credibility of your healthcare mobile app. Some of the most essential compliances your mHealth app must abide by are HIPAA, HITECH Act, GDPR, etc.

Apart from all these considerations mentioned, one of the most important aspects that you must focus on while developing your mHealth app is the selection of the right development platform. Ideally there are two choices native and cross-platform. To know which development platform suits your mHealth app the best, you must know the complexity of the application and the devices that you want the device to run on.

TIP: Understand what you are offering, and that will help you develop the ideal mHealth application.

Functionality Matter – Must-have Features

Features define the functionality of your mHealth application, which is directly related to the success of your mobile health solutions. To simplify that process while aligning it with the clinical care journey, here are some of the must-have features of your mHealth app.

Must-have features for patients:

1. Appointment Scheduling: The application should make it easier for the patient to schedule their appointment with the provider. Giving them a choice to choose which healthcare provider can be one of your USPs, but that completely depends on your offerings. Other than everything the patient should first experience the application as a good and one of the best appointment booking apps.

2. Medication Management: Another aspect of the mHealth app is that it should allow the patient to manage their medication and request add-ons whenever required. With this, your custom healthcare software also acts as a medication management apps adding another functionality to its feature list.

3. Secure Communication: If you are offering consultations through mobile health solutions, then the application should provide secure communication features for connecting with healthcare providers.

Must-have features for providers:

1. Data Tracking Capabilities: The mHealth app must have data tracking capabilities to make it easier for providers to access, analyze, and interpret patient health on the basis of data.

2. Wearable Device Compatibility: The healthcare mobile application should be compatible with wearable devices and transmit the data from the devices to the providers’ system to make the care delivery process digital.

3. Educational Content Libraries: The very first process of mobile healthcare application development comes in handy here. The application must have educational content libraries that can be shared with patients to raise awareness and educate them about their conditions.

During the development phase have a brief focus on languages offered in the application for wider accessibility. Since there is a wide spread diversity, people familiar with their mother-tongue can provide a simple way to understand the clinical pathway and functioning of the application.

Building for the Future: Scalability & Maintenance

Looking at the adoption stats of mHealth applications the rise of mobile health solutions is bound to increase. Apart from that, by closing the gaps between provider and patients, the relevance of health tech apps is bound to grow. That is why your application should provide you with enough flexibility to scale by adding new features and users as the practice grows.

Along with that, you should also provide regular updates and fix the bugs to maintain the application’s optimal performance. This practice will also help you enhance your security and offer users an elevated experience of care. It will help you to answer the question of ‘how to ensure security in healthcare mobile apps.’

This also incorporates a feedback mechanism that will help you in improving your application as per your core users need. All these things can be easily done with the help of cloud-based solutions as it will not only offer you enough data storage and scalability. Along with that, it is also one of the best practices for developing a HIPAA compliant healthcare app.

Beyond Development: Marketing & User Engagement

In this highly digital age, developing a healthcare app is simply not enough. Along with the development, you should focus on marketing the application so that it can reach the right target audience. Connect with the right healthcare providers and implement the right strategy that would attract your user group. For instance, if you’re offering generic consultation, promoting the application during the physical patient consultations can be effective in getting patients to use the application and scale your practice to a platform with digital health trends.

While doing so, you also need to focus on implementing a strong user engagement strategy to retain users and encourage them to use the application for care delivery. One of the best practices for developing healthcare mobile apps that is an instant hit in the market is to launch loyalty programs and introduce personalized features to enhance user experience. This way the custom healthcare software can also act as a patient engagement apps for elevated experience.

TIP: Use Data Analytics to track user behavior and optimize the application as per your users’ behavior to enhance their experience.

Frequently Asked Questions