MVP Development for VitalOP Wellness to Facilitate Chronic Disease Management
Summary
ScienceSoft delivered the MVP of a chronic disease care product. It helps the user stay in control of their health state and access unique personalized content targeted at users’ health conditions.
About VitalOp Wellness
VitalOp Wellness is a Louisiana-based startup launched by experienced healthcare practitioners. The startup offers education, guidance, and accountability to users with chronic diseases like diabetes, prediabetes, cardiovascular diseases, etc. To achieve better care outcomes for users, the Client was looking for a way to empower people with chronic diseases to take control over their health. The solution was to help engage patients in the process of disease reversal instead of just managing disease and create holistic records of patient health state (featuring information from different care providers, lifestyle data, etc.).
With an initial concept of a user and an admin app, the Client was looking for a proficient healthcare software development partner to turn their vision into reality.
MVP Design and Development Process
Trusting ScienceSoft’s proven track record in healthcare mobile app development, VitalOp Wellness approached us to plan and develop the chronic disease care MVP.
Without delay, ScienceSoft’s team got to product requirements elicitation, feature set design, solution and project planning. During the product design stage, ScienceSoft’s regulatory consultant analyzed the planned functionality and the potential software risks and concluded that the platform didn’t require FDA submission. Still, as the software was to process PHI, ScienceSoft followed HIPAA guidelines during the development.
ScienceSoft built the product using containerized architecture and AWS services (e.g., Amazon EC2, Amazon ECS). During the development, VitalOp Wellness welcomed feedback from investors and potential consumers on the desired functionality to create a truly practical product. Thanks to the Agile approach to the development process, the identified user needs could be easily translated into new project requirements and implemented during the following project iterations.
The MVP development stage was completed within 5 months. ScienceSoft delivered an admin web app for content management and a mobile cross-platform user application for chronic disease management. The developed solution combined the functionality for self-learning, disease self-management, and health record keeping.
User-Facing Functionality
Application users (people with chronic diseases) enter their health and lifestyle information manually and have access to the following functionality:
- User onboarding: user registration, user consent to PHI processing, an introductory video explaining the app functionality, app subscription payment gateway, and pop-up guidance on app functionality.
- Health assessment: a health questionnaire.
- A lifestyle tracker featuring weight, hours of sleep, number of steps and personal step goals, water consumption.
- A personal health record tab to add and view health information and export it to a ready-to-print PDF. The record features personal and geographical data, weight, height, BMI, blood pressure, blood glucose, and HbA1c level, all diagnoses, medications (current and canceled), lab tests, recent procedures (e.g., Pap smear, ophthalmic exam), upcoming visits to doctors. A user can show or send the PDF file to a physician via external messengers.
- A personal wellness journey tab with recommended content (e.g., articles on the user’s conditions, videos) and a gallery with all available health content for different chronic conditions.
- Nutrition guidance: PDF files with lists of healthy and unhealthy food options, a library of unique healthy recipes.
- A notifications tab: configurable notifications of procedures and tests, water consumption, daily activity, etc.
Alisha Timon and Mandy Crow, CEOs of VitalOp Wellness, say:
From the very start, we wanted to give our users maximum control over their health conditions and well-being. We wanted to help them create transparent and easy-to-share records, offer tailored guidance toward the healthy lifestyle with goal-setting, notifications, and exclusive content.
With ScienceSoft, we got exactly what we needed when conceptualizing and developing the product. It was a pleasure working with them. ScienceSoft’s team is thoughtful, proactive, and well-rounded in healthcare specifics.
Admin Functionality
Admins can upload unique content on chronic disease management via a web app, e.g., articles on medication use, healthy food recipes, and videos on chronic diseases.
To personalize the content and help the users navigate through it, the admins add relevant keywords to each content item. After the upload, the content is displayed to the patients with relevant conditions on their personal wellness journey tabs.
Key Outcomes for the Client
- A fully functional chronic disease management product MVP within 5 months.
- Easy way to collect the full medical history from different healthcare providers, up-to-date vitals, and lifestyle data.
- Unique content to support patients in their journey toward a healthy lifestyle.
Technologies
React Native, React, TypeScript, Node.js, Amazon EC2, Amazon ECS, Amazon RDS, Amazon S3, AWS DevOps services, Amazon CloudWatch.