When it comes to software, healthcare organizations are faced with complex needs. They must keep pace with technological advancements, meet rising patient, clinician, and staff expectations, support their teams with multifaceted tooling, and more. But buying software out of the box often isn’t enough to meet those diverse needs, and building software takes time, money, and a team of experienced developers.
Low-code no-code platforms are providing new paths forward for organizations looking to build effective software. According to Grand View Research, the low-code platform market is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 22.5% through 2030. This growth is being driven by the versatile nature of these platforms, which can help make software development scalable, agile, and user-friendly.
But what are the requirements for these different development models? Is it worth taking on the burden of development alone, or should you partner with a vendor? Let’s explore how to decide what’s right for your organization and how to identify the right partner for your development journey.
Generally, there are three primary areas to consider when assessing your organization’s capacity for developing new software: technical expertise, budget, and time.
By understanding what resources are available to your organization based on these three categories, you can get a better grasp of what development model will suit your needs.
Whether you have a vision of what you want in an application or don’t know where to start, partnering with a consultancy can help. They can provide a network of support and expertise to fall back on, ensure development stays on track, handle ongoing maintenance, and more.
Think of it like this: How much do you want to take off your staff’s plate? The more involved your team is, the higher the operational cost will be, and more resources will need to be dedicated to development and maintenance. When you partner with a low-code developer, a no-code agency, or a consultancy for a fully custom build, you can offload most of the workload by relying on their expertise.
Ultimately, vendors understand their low-code no-code platforms better than anyone. Leaning on that knowledge enables them to focus on what they do best — building seamless user experiences — so your clinicians can focus on spending more time with patients and making better-informed clinical decisions, and your leaders can better optimize staff resources and move higher-value, more strategic tasks forward.
Working with low-code vendors or a no-code agency can make a big difference, but to ensure maximum impact, you need to find the right partner.
Choosing a partner can be a complex process all on its own — it takes more than simply comparing costs, but understanding the quality of the software they develop as well.
According to a Health Systems (Basingstoke) assessment, there’s a critical need to validate and verify software quality in the healthcare space. Malfunctions and erroneous calculations can negatively impact clinical decision-making, open up sensitive data to security risk, constrain performance, and more. When human lives and the quality and speed of care are on the line, it’s vital to find the ideal software fit.
To understand the true value a partner can bring to the table, you must measure their commitment to software quality by vetting their capabilities and asking the right questions.
Here’s what to look for when vetting a vendor’s capabilities:
It’s also wise to make a list of must-have features, preferred capabilities, and other priorities in your software to help narrow down the playing field. And keep the future in mind, too — you may not need certain features today, but what about in the long term? You want a vendor that can grow with you.
Here are some important questions to ask vendors:
In a complicated healthcare landscape, it can feel overwhelming to go it alone and build a solution that solves all your needs, but it doesn’t have to be that way. By asking the right questions, you can find a partner who listens and understands your needs. That trust is critical to standing up the software your patients and providers demand — with plenty of room to grow, flex, and scale as their needs evolve.
Looking for a collaborative healthcare consulting partner? Get started with Elxo today — we’re happy to set up a no-obligation discussion to help build a just-right solution for your organization.