Hospitals are one of such places where people have different memories. We all might recall the time when we have to wake up early to get an early doctor’s appointment, or patients have to stand in a queue waiting for their turns. It was difficult to take doctor’s appointment amid the situation when patients aren’t in a condition to stand for long hours.  

But thanks to a well-designed appointment app that can help in putting an end to all those discomforts. The various development done in the health care industry has increased the demands of the medical app.  

Stats say:  

  • Almost 1.7 billion smartphone users have a healthcare app since 2017.  
  • Not just users, even doctors, are making the most mobile app. It was found that more than 80% of physicians use medical apps on a regular basis.  

The above stats show that on–demand medical appointment solutions are here to revolutionize the healthcare sector. 

Also, the recent COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc among the people, as a result of which they are reluctant to visit a hospital or clinic to address their health issues. It is already a known fact that the chances of getting infected rises in crowded places. Hence, many patients prefer staying home, either self-medicating themselves or risking their conditions to become worse.   

The healthcare service providers are now adopting alternative ways over the traditional way of getting a doctor’s appointment. In this initiative, modern healthcare technology has outshined as a savior to let patients and doctors held appointments virtually.  

Combating COVID-19 spread with software developments  

Many governments worldwide have already adopted the use of modern software to fight against the spread of COVID-19. Amid this chaos, many apps like Indian Aarogya Setu, Spanish Salud Responde, Polish Home Quarantine (Kwarantana domowa), etc., have played a vital role in preventing the spread of the virus and guiding the users about the symptoms, behavior of the virus, data collection for research.  

You might have also known about the existence of such chatbots that share all the latest news related to the pandemic. However, none of the above provided the solution to the disease.   

Now, the question arises how a patient who isn’t infected by coronavirus can visit a doctor safely and quickly?  

The answer is quite simple by using the on-demand appointment app for patients and doctors. This app is a platform that can be an effective alternative in the medical sector and several in-office visits.  

If you are a budding entrepreneur wishing to create a lot of business, try developing a mobile appointment app.  

Types of revenue models for appointment app for doctors  

Prior to developing your own appointment app for doctors, it is important to understand how and from where you can generate revenue. Different types of revenue models can help you with the same. Let’s have a sneak-peek at some of them below.  

Paid listing  

The revenue model is a boon for all the doctors who aren’t able to enjoy the same exposure and success compared to other successful doctors. They can pay some amount as a fee to get themselves on the list of the featured doctors. Once highlighted in the list of featured doctors, they are more likely to receive calls and inquiries from the patients.  

Commission-based model   

This kind of revenue model is one of the simplest ways where doctors give some portion of their fees to the app owner from where the patient has contacted them. The appointment booking app provides a lot of exposure and patients to the doctors. As a commission, the doctor pays some part of his/her fees to the app.  

In-app advertisement  

Apart from the two revenue models mentioned above, there is another way to generate revenue for the app owner. The in-app advertisement is the way. Here one can charge fees to flash in-app advertisements from interested healthcare brands and companies.  

What are the must-have features in the best doctor appointment app?  

To ensure that your on-demand doctor booking app is providing top-notch service, the below-mentioned features must be in your mobile application.  

Profile creation 

Creating an app without the profile creation section will be a meaningless app. Hence, if you are creating a doctor appointment app, ensure to provide the option of profile creation for both the doctors and patients. Let them fill in important details to create their respective profiles. Following are the information a doctor’s profile may consist of:  

  • Doctor’s location: Allowing doctors to mention their location can help them in being found in the near location. You can also provide an option to add the distance counter between the patient and the doctor. 
  • Competence: In this section, the doctor can mention their education, specialty, experience, professional certifications, and much more information to convince a patient about their professionalism.  
  • Photos: Here, doctors can insert pictures of their workplaces, staff members, facilities they provide, etc.  
  • Rating: This section will highlight the ratings and reviews provided by the patients to the doctors.  

When it’s about a patient’s profile, the following information is needed:  

  • First and last name: This information helps the doctor keep a record of the patients he/she has treated by their name and get to know how to address them in the future.  
  • Phone number: Having patients phone numbers can help doctors to make a quick call to their patients and ask about their well-being after the treatment was done.  
  • Address: The patient’s address helps the mobile application to create a list of nearby doctors.  
  • Age, sex, and other information: This information is also an important section to know the patients. It can help in providing the necessary treatments to them.  

Searching  

Every well-designed app has this section. This feature smoothens patients’ search experience. As they are allowed to search for doctors as per their needs by using various filters like doctor’s specialty, price, area, type of care, preferable time, and many more.    

For example, if a patient is suffering from some nerve disorder, he/she can search for neurologists in their nearby area instead of browsing the complete list of doctors from the database.  

Ensure that your search feature has various filters to ease patients’ doctor searching process by providing quick, accurate, and relevant information.  

Appointment booking  

After the patient selects the suitable doctor for their treatment, allow them to book an appointment with the doctor. Your app can also provide a built-in chat feature where patients and doctors can discuss the situation to avoid any confusion and ensure that they are on the same page. Once things are set, the doctor can confirm the appointment request.  

SOS/Emergency feature  

It’s impossible to predict any medical emergency. That’s why it is important to have the emergency feature in your online appointment booking app that can manage all the SOS/emergency cases. This can let the user call an ambulance with only a few clicks.  

GPS tracking  

It is the feature that helps both doctors and patients to locate each other in case of any emergency by following the accurate and shortest routes.  

Live video conferencing feature  

Live video conferencing is an important feature to be part of an online appointment booking app. It helps patients to have personal interactions with their doctors within no time. Also, saves user’s time as they don’t need to visit the clinic all the time. Especially in the current situation when stepping out is like risking your life.  

Payment options  

In this tech-savvy world, the cashless society is emerging as a solution. Hence it is important to integrate the in-built payment gateway in your on-demand doctor appointment app. It will help users make payments through multiple payment options such as debit cards, credit cards, and online wallets hassle-free.  

Also, the payment option is the last stage of your app service, so it becomes important that none of your users should go through a hectic procedure. For a smooth process, follow the below criteria:  

  • The payment process should be less complicated so that the users should perform only a few actions.  
  • The process should be quick to minimize the processing time.  
  • It must provide top-notch security against frauds and scams.  

To add on, your app can also generate an automatic invoice with the payment’s records. This advantage can also be useful for the hospital staff to generate pay-slips.   

Document sharing  

This feature can let patients share their previous prescription and medical records with the doctors. It can surely help in assisting the doctors in the diagnosis process.  

Push notifications  

Push notifications are one of the features that help doctors and patients stay in touch. The users can get push notifications on their mobile phones even when they are not using it. The notification can be reminders about appointments, medicines, etc.  

What are the tips to follow to develop a successful on-demand doctor appointment application?  

Just developing a doctor appointment and booking application is not enough. You have to follow other tips to ensure it is a great success.  

Following are a few tips to follow:   

  • Give benefits to doctors: It is important to provide the doctors available on your app to get a seamless experience, great visibility, a simple payment gateway, etc.  
  • Establish a good network of doctors: When you are running an app, you must focus on building a good network of trusted and experienced doctors. This makes it easy for the patients to choose the best expert and get the assurity that the best hands are curing their illness.  
  • Doctor authentication: Before including any doctor on your platform, you must ensure their authenticity. Evaluate their work history. This step is crucial and mustn’t be overlooked as any doctor’s bad reputation directly affects your mobile application.  
  • Offer discounts: Offering discounts to users can be the best way to retain new and old users. You can provide various discounts, promos, and other loyalty offers to attract them.  
  • Select the best technology stack: It is quite important to select the best technology stack that suits your on-demand doctor appointment mobile application. You can go for cutting-edge technologies like machine learning and artificial intelligence to integrate creative features for both patients and doctors.  
  • Careful selection of monetization strategy: To run a successful app, you must choose the best revenue model. It is important to draft the membership plans in the most attractive way to attract doctors to get listed on your application.  

Steps to develop the best doctor booking application  

Now, as we know the must-have features and important tips to develop a mobile application, it’s time to check out the various steps involved in the development process.  

Decide on the app concept  

The first step to build a successful app is to have clarity about your app’s requirements. Also, you must know what your business model is? Have a clear idea about the audience you are targeting. Once you zero down your initial requirements, you must do extensive audience research. To validate your concept, you can use audience research. Once done, you can come up with minor alterations.  

Business analysis  

Once you are clear about your app concept, you can hire a team of competent business analysts and build the wireframes and diagrams for various use cases of your doctor appointment scheduling software.  

App designing  

Now comes the turn of app designing. Ensure that your app has a simple and engaging design. For better UX design, you can hire the best developers who can reduce the number of steps involved in the medical appointment software.  

App development  

For this step, you must have a better understanding of the guidelines of AppStore. If not, you can hire a well-informed app development team who can do it wisely for you. While hiring, give preference to the candidates with a portfolio who has experience developing apps that match your application’s requirement.  

Quality assurance  

Once the medical appointment app is created, it must go through rigorous tests and quality assurance processes. Such tests will help in deciding that the app is capable of optimum performance. It must also pass rigorous speed testing, integration testing, unit testing, load testing, security testing, and regression testing.  

App launching process  

Launching an app is a big success. Make sure that you have created a successful pre-launch campaign that will run throughout the development process. Try to give your audience the reason to be curious about your app. To make it a grand launch, engage with the industry leaders and influencers. Reach out to users via different channels to add to your success.  

Wrapping up  

The medical app for a doctor’s appointment increases popularity and attracts many people, including entrepreneurs, doctors, patients, and medical institutions.  

Hope this blog must have informed you a lot about developing an on-demand appointment app for patients and doctors.  

If you are one of those brilliant minds wishing to develop a successful medical app, Best1Tech, a mobile app development company, can help. We have:  

  • Developed 3000+ apps  
  • 200+ Happy Client  
  • Designed 1400+ Website Design  
  • 2200+ apps developers  

We are backed by years of expertise and happy clients across the globe.  

Contact us to discuss your app development idea with the industry experts. 

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