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The Complete Guide to Wellness Software Development
Why Health Portals & Apps Matter More Now Than Ever Before
mentormate.com | 3036 Hennepin Avenue, Minneapolis, MN 55408 | (888) 710-3307
Taking a pulse on wellness trends
Contents
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Who ignores doctors’ orders?
Improving patient habits with technology
How to create health portals, apps and software patients want to use
Health and wellness software kick-off plan
Deciding what’s next
It’s no secret that healthcare is a $3 trillion dollar market.1 Payers, providers and practitioners know that costs need to drop and fast. Treating patients retroactively for chronic conditions that developed after years of poor habits is costly, and often, ineffective. Habits have formed, and they can be all but impossible to shake — like not finishing a piece of pepperoni pizza halfway through the slice. Now imagine if you hadn’t taken that first bite.
That’s exactly how many employers, payers and providers are viewing the capability of wellness and, more importantly, wellness technology. Wellness portals, apps and solutions have the potential to engage users at the very top of the funnel when they are most susceptible to behavioral changes that drive down costs, prevent chronic conditions and ultimately save lives.
The power of preventative health
of healthcare spending in 2010 was used by people with one or more chronic conditions 2
86%
Taking a pulse on wellness trends
The prognosis for wellness and prevention has much room for improvement. Medicationadherence remains one noticeable symptomof the larger problem. Over 33 percent of new patient prescriptions are never filled.3 Beyond that, half of patients with chronic conditions cease taking their prescriptions 180 days after they are written, according to the National Institutes of Health.4
Nationwide checkup
These low rates of patient follow-throughwouldn’t be a problem if only a few were responsible for maintaining their health with medication. That’s not the case. Nearly halfof all Americans, 48% to be exact, take at least one prescription drug.5 Patients who don’t adhere to their prescription regime require additional care and often hospital stays. This alone can ring up a bill of $289 billion per year, as determined by the Network for Excellence in Health Innovation, a non-profitnational health policy institute in Massachusetts.6
That’s just the financial cost. There’s also the very real cost of human lives to consider, to the tune of 125,000 lives lost each year related to nonadherence.
Medication adherence is a problem — a big one
48%of Americans
take at least one prescription drug5
Who ignores doctors’ orders?
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research completed a study in 2014 exploring the people behind high rates of nonadherence. They examined health data from 16,000 patients. They found thoseleast likely to take or fill their prescriptions were those prescribed the most expensive drugs along with those using medication to treat chronicconditions. This alone begins to explain the highfinancial and human costs of nonadherence.7
Taking stock of behavioral trends
Curing medication nonadherence
Who ignores doctors’ orders
Patients with high co-pays
Patients with multiple serious medical conditions
Source: Townsend 8
Who follows doctors’ orders
Patients with 5+ medications
Patients who make more physician visits
Patients in their 60’s
Patients who were recently hospitalized or visited the ER
Cheating when it comes to health and wellness has much more serious consequences than sneaking a look at your opponent’s hand in a game of cards when they’re distracted. Ignoring the warning signs for a serious condition or failing to follow a practitioner’s guidelines to maintain health can be life-threatening.
Cost, unwanted side-effects and failure to understand the benefits of medication all contribute to patients’ inability to effectively maintain their health. Patient outcomes are no longer a personal issue. Increasingly, providers are asked to shoulder the financial cost of quality patient care and at-home maintenance. Medicare will now reduce funding to acute care hospitals with excess readmissions.9 Why? Readmissions point to a hospital’s failure to communicate the benefits of ongoing care and patients’ inability to maintain the expected standards. Senior researchers believe this inverse financial incentive will spur providers to take a more progressive role in patient engagement and activation.10
The stakes are high for patients who gamble with health & wellness Why can’t patients follow the rules?
Improving patient habits with technology
Patient activation is a measure researchers use to describe how involved users are in the maintenance of their health. Researchers have found a link between activated patients and the populations who engage in preventative behaviors like taking prescriptions as directed and living well. Patients with higher activation levels engage in more preventative behaviors, seek information about their health more readily and engage in self-health management — like taking their prescriptions as directed.
Beginning to hold providers accountable for quality patient care points toward the increasing emphasis on wellness and preventative health. Patient activation lies at the center of this national trend.
What is patient activation and why does it matter?
Engaged users are healthy patients
All the figures around preventative health come down to one simple idea. Empower patients to take a more active role in the management of their care and improve health outcomes while driving down industry costs. To do this providers, practitioners, payers and start-ups are turning to wellness technology — from apps to portals. In patients with hypertension, more highly activated
patients are more likely to take medication as directed.10
LEVEL 1
LEVEL 4
Patients with higher activation levels are more likely to read about complications associated with their conditions.12
Empower patients. Save lives.
31% 36%
88%78%
How to create health portals, apps and software patients want to use
Patient activation is the problem. Solutions that help users engage in understanding and managing their health is the answer. The battle to create technology that cuts through the noise can be a daunting one. The most common use case for an app is fleeting. It is opened. Then promptly forgotten about. Partnering with technologists, developers and strategists who understand the potential in healthcare is the keyto imagining, designing and developing technology that patients care about and continue using.
When designing a wellness solution, it starts with just one question.
Creating a worthwhile solution is harder than it looks
Solution
Problem
The first question to ask yourself when considering a health or wellness solution is a simple one. Should you custom build the software new, or should you adapt a pre-existing white label solution? There are considerations of course.
Do you anticipate wanting more functionality and control in the future?
How large is your budget?
Do you trust that the manufacturer of the white label software will remain solvent and able to provide support as long as you need it?
To build or not to build?
Curious about putting a white label app or portal to work for you business? Consider your long-term strategy. There’s no question that integrating with third-party products can reduce initial development costs. This is, of course, assuming that the solution is being used exactly as it was designed. If you don’t plan to change anything about the app, this may pay off in the long-run. On the other hand, what you save initially may come back to haunt you. Custom add-ons or adapting the app/portal as your business needs change is often difficult. The only thing worse than struggling through a frustrating sequence of futile development attempts or work-arounds is having your product constrain growth.
White label apps — saving costs or prolonging the frustration?
While white label solutions certainly have their drawbacks, using them to release software within a limited time frame is a valid strategy. In the long-term though, the only way to avoid finding yourself at the mercy of the manufacturer is to custom develop your app, portal or website.
If custom development seems outside of your budget, think about it this way: Pay now for exactly what you want or pay later by cobbling add-ons in an attempt to differentiate a white label solution.
Custom design goes a long way, especially when you have an experienced and talented team developing high-quality work. Creating your health app from scratch will give you much greater flexibility compared to a solution composed of several off-the-shelf components.
So you decided to custom-build a wellness solution. What’s next?
Health and wellness software kick-off plan
This will give your business the upper hand in a competitive marketplace. If your partner continually seeks to understand and implement emerging technologies, you will be able to adapt and grow your solution faster than competitors.
Find a partner who seeks out new technologies
Any good development partner will take you through a series of ideation exercisesto determine your user personas and help you understand how these key audiences will interact with your solution and what they will gain. Knowing who your core users are is pivotal to anticipating their needs as yoursoftware evolves.
Explore your target audience
Knowing who your core users are is pivotal to anticipating their needs as your software evolves.
Different variables can influence whether you decide to build a native app, responsive website, portal or combination of the three. Web applications are appealing to many since they translate well onto a majority of devices — desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones and the web-browser-enabled cars of the future. Historically, web applications haven’t been able to leverage the robust technical capabilities as well as native apps. This gap is quickly closing.
Choose a solution: mobile or web
Considering current capabilities, native apps generally have better offline capabilities. They are the only choice if your solution requires integration with Bluetooth devices. Producing a native app also makes more sense if your solution will require a significant amount of on-device storage.
Maybe you don’t have to choose at all. Often, product road maps include a native app and web experience. A top development partner can help you maximize your spend on development and design.
Top 2 reasons to create a web appThey’re less expensive to produce
They don’t require device- specific customization
Selecting the features you would like your solution to launch with will help you set up a reasonable development roadmap. The best development partners go through this process with you. Feature prioritization allows you to remain on-time and on-budget bringing your solution to market.
Define your priority features
A smaller subset of your target audience with defined behaviors and traits. To determine the user personas who will be interacting with your solution, first identify the scenarios of use.
Who are these people?
How will they interact with the application?
Why do they want to interact with the application?
What are their goals?
User personas
Deciding what’s next
This is a common scenario. You’ve released a white label app or web solution a year or two ago. Lately, things just haven’t been functioning as they should. How do you know whether you should cut ties and begin work on a new tool or adapt your current solution?
Sometimes you just have to cut the cord
Tell-tale signs your relationship with your current software has run its course:
A support company no longer exists or they aren’t responsive. The inability to reach users on mobile or through a web browser is another flashing red beacon to move on to something new. This is where your users are and want to be. Your solution needs to be available there too.
Excessive customization of your white labelsolution also screams, “Time to seek out a development partner.” If you have needs greater than what a basic solution can provide, it’s time to begin working with a team who can help you realize them.
MentorMate has designed, delivered and staffed digital experiences since 2001. Along the way we’ve learned a lot. Now it’s time to share. That’s why we founded MobCon in 2012 and MobCon Digital Health in 2015. Each year we host conferences for the top minds in mobile and digital strategy to do just that. Be part of what’s next and dive deep into the trends and technologies revolutionizing engagement in today’s business landscape. Connect. Listen. Grow. We’ve taken the leap. Have you? Register for our next event at mobcon.com
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Talk with an expert
Ready to innovate? Contact us to learn more about the potential to build or adapt wellness technology. We’re all ears.
References
1 9
Millenson, Michael. (2015, June 8). Health Datapalooza: A Shot of Whiskey, A “Data Hippie” And Capitalism. http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelmillen-son/2015/06/08/health-datapalooza-a-shot-of-whiskey-a-data-hippie-and-capitalism/
The official U.S. Government site for Medicare. (2015, June 16). Linking quality to payment. http://www.medicare.gov/hospitalcompare/linking-quality-to-payment.html?AspxAutoDe-tectCookieSupport=1
2 10
11
12
3
4
5, 6
7, 8
Koeppl, Patrick & Robertson, Emily. ( 2015, June 4). The healthy choice: How behavioral factors create influential health campaigns. http://dupress.com/articles/behav-ior-change-communications-in-health-care/?id=us:2el:3dc:dup958:eng:behx:dcpromo
Hibbard, Judith H. 2008. Increasing patient activation to improve health and reduce costs. http://iom.edu/~/media/Files/Activity%20Files/Quality/VSRT/IC%20Meeting%20Docs/VILC%20Patients%2010-04-11/Judith%20Hib-bard2.pdf
Hibbard, J. (2008). Engaging consumersto improve health and reduce costs [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from www.allhealth.org/briefingmaterials/Hib-bard-1727.ppt bard2.pdf
See Hibbard, Increasing patient activation.
Townsend, Angela. (2014, April 1). Ignoring doctor’s orders: Not filling new prescription is common patient habit, study shows. http://www.cleveland.com/healthfit/index.ssf/2014/04/ignoring_doctors_orders_not_fill-ing_new_prescription_is_common_patient_habit_study_shows.html
Tozzi, John. (2013, March 28). ‘Take your pills’ reminders from apps and gadgets. http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/arti-cles/2013-03-28/take-your-pills-reminders-from-apps-and-gadgets
See Tozzi.
See Townsend.
