Last year, the world went remote because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and it stayed remote since.
Most of the recognized telemedicine platforms offer a standalone solution and rarely specialize in a certain area of expertise, providing a wide spectrum of services and diagnostics. These platforms, at the same time, often offer API capabilities that can help to integrate the solution with other services.

One of the most important factors in the success of telemedicine is scalability. With certain process optimization and automation (for instance, learning the pre-existing conditions through a survey), telemedicine is more affordable and attractive to patients. Healthcare is rather expensive in the US, after all.

But herein lies the bigger problem: while the demand in the market sector is clear, existing telemedicine providers may not be flexible enough to meet the demands of the more specialized clinics or institutions. Could a custom telemedicine solution be a viable answer?

Yes, it can be. Let’s get a little deeper.

What’s happening to telemedicine right now?

Telemedicine is past its infancy, but still, it shares many problems with the rest of the disruptive IT tech. It will take more time and validation for it to become truly widespread. Healthcare is, arguably, a very stubborn industry to accept new changes. The pandemic accelerated the process greatly, however.

Tech is improving. Technology advances rapidly in the healthcare sector. The number of tools, devices, and in-home trackers that can be integrated with a telemedicine solution keeps on growing. More and more conditions can be monitored and treated remotely. Heart rate, breath rate, blood sugar, blood pressure, and many more metrics can be communicated into the system.
Reduction of state law barriers. The Congress and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) continue to advocate for use of telehealth services. The industry will become more and more regulated over time as the lawmakers’ research and observe the progress (and challenges) of providing healthcare services remotely.
The onset of AI healthcare. The horizons on the use of AI in the healthcare industry are nearly endless. While it is early to say what course it will take in the future, AI is without a doubt making its way into the telemedicine sector. Chatbots, diagnostics, predictive modeling, and much more aid the clinics to increase patient capacity, provide quick answers, and help to build patient history.
Stricter rules for data privacy. Without strong data protection protocols, a telemedicine solution is doomed to fail. The penalty for mishandling sensitive patient data is downright capital. The healthcare sector is an attractive target for criminals – sensitive health data can be used in blackmail. To operate reliably, most telehealth solutions must gain compliance with the local acts and standards, such as HIPAA, HL7, and others.

Who are the major players in the field?

It is always worthwhile to get a landscape view of all of your available options before committing to integrating a solution into your workflow or working on a custom one. Let’s take a look at a trio of the major players in the US.

Do note: we are not affiliated with any of these services and our choice is purely editorial.

1. Mend. Mend offers a wide range of services to its clients. Among the popular features are online forms, patient self-scheduling, SMS reminders, and much more. Mend excels at providing a good user experience and ensures high LTV from its customers. Mend capitalizes on automation to improve productivity and ensure a steady user journey. Even the online forms can be filled through drag and drop, making the use of the platform a good experience. It’s possible to integrate most EHR and PM software platforms with Mend, thanks to its API capabilities.
2. Doxy.me. Doxy.me is a telemedicine SaaS solution that is free to use for online communication with doctors. The patients really enjoy the opportunity to use the solution without having to register. There is no app available for Android or iOS (at least for now), making it a solution available only on desktop. Thanks to its API, it can be easily integrated with other EHR, PM, or other services. The solution is HIPAA compliant, and paid tiers offer even more security and encryption to ensure maximum data protection, as well as other perks – configurable notifications, higher video quality, and more.
3. Teladoc. Teladoc isn’t meant to be a full-fledged telemedicine solution, but rather a tool to access the nationwide network of doctors. With Teladoc, a patient can use the app on their phone to connect with the desired doctor and communicate directly without having to leave home.It is just as convenient to use for doctors as it is for users – through the mobile app. Teladoc cannot be used for emergency care and positions itself as an app for non-emergency consultations. Through it, only routine prescriptions can be made. Even so, so far it has seen considerable success on the market.

The roadblocks of telehealth integration

Telemedicine is a hard and expensive business to break into, and for all the good reasons.

Compliance and security. While there is no law requiring you to be HIPAA certified, you must be HIPAA-compliant in order to provide online healthcare services. This is a tremendous task to undergo on your own, especially as a small clinic or healthcare provider. The potential problems after a data breach can be downright disastrous for a clinic.
Local law. The Congress is working actively with telehealth policies, negotiating reimbursement rates for insurance. While it is a target for telehealth to be more affordable to the general public than in-person visits, forcing any kind of platform that practices telehealth to be HIPAA compliant may incur considerable expenses to new businesses.
In Europe, this area is mostly covered by the GDPR, which is another story entirely. In general, strong data privacy and protection become mandatory around the world for any healthcare provider to operate.
The learning curve. Not everyone is well-versed in technology. The learning curve for your average doctor may vary depending on the field and the UI of the particular solution, but there’s no denying that there will be resistance to the adoption of new technology. This issue can be dealt with by providing study material and training to doctors and practitioners. Sometimes even a well-made knowledge base may be worth its weight in gold.
The common issues of the SaaS solutions. Overcapacity, Denying-of-service attacks, data breaches, app incompatibility, and many more underlying issues can prevent the service from being accessible to the public. Without a comprehensive strategy that can successfully deflect these problems, the service may experience issues that will drive great dissatisfaction among its user base.

Is it worth it to develop a custom telehealth solution?

You didn’t hear it from us, but it is – if no other vendor can meet your requirements for a reasonable price. There is no denying that the world is unlikely to completely go back to normal in the coming years, and that’s a great opportunity to offer your patients an opportunity to remain as your clients remotely.

Telemedicine, after all, is meant to provide service to patients on a commercial basis. If you can make sure that a custom solution will provide a better service to your customers (through a better interface, better UI, more professional service, etc), then it is absolutely worth it. There are other advantages to that, too:

Control over development and design: you get to choose how your telemedicine platform will look like, even if it is an integration with another service that is used as the main provider.
No hidden costs or extra expenses along the way: You get what you pay for.
Complete a digital overview of your patient’s history, scans, and files in one place.
Automation of routine tasks through chatbots, surveys, and more – a great time saver for your doctors.
Support of necessary languages if other standalone solutions do not provide it: because scalability means you can go global.
Your doctors, depending on their specialty, can work outside your clinic as well.

What are the first steps to custom virtual clinic development?

Keep in mind that a HIPAA-compliant telehealth solution is an expensive undertaking. Without due planning, this can be a costly project to mend later.

Define project scope. Ask yourself why any other vendor was unable to meet your requirements and document what you want to see in your custom solution. It’s highly advisable to use the help of a skilled business analyst to prepare the necessary workflows if such an opportunity is available.
Ensure strong data protection. You will need highly encrypted data channels and storage, with breach protocols in place to quickly react to any potential security issue. Without that in place, you are at risk of serious lawsuits and fines.
Account for scalability. The idea that you will run out of storage space, or get overwhelmed by incoming inquiries should not get shelved and forgotten. It’s important to pick the right hosting services that allow an increase of storage space on demand and provide protection in case of website/service capacity overload.
Aim for good UI. One of the most common problems reported by users of various telehealth problems is bad UI. User-centric design is an emerging discipline, but one that should be given due respect when you are creating your own virtual clinic. Consider getting the help of a UX specialist at least during the early stages of product conceptualization in order to ensure the best UX possible. Your users will appreciate that.

Conclusion

You’ll get the bang out of your buck for sure, but it’s a big thing to start. Perhaps we can help?

To a patient, having 24/7 access to a whole network of doctors is a different game completely. Being able to provide that service and delight the customer in a way that wasn’t possible before will be a driving factor to success in years to come. Patients will be able to enjoy faster diagnosis, round-the-clock care, and monitoring.

Not to mention the cost reduction and scalability an offline facility would struggle to reach, given the same tasks. The profitability of telemedicine is indisputable.

Get in touch with us if you’d like to learn more about how to get started with your virtual clinic.

February 17, 2021 Artezio Blog admin

Is starting a virtual clinic worth it?