Features Worth Considering to Launch Online Medical Appointment Booking Platform

Finding a reliable doctor is difficult but more difficult is getting a hassle-free appointment with the doctor you trust. Online doctor search & appointment scheduling platforms like Practo & ZocDoc resolve this headache and help people accomplish these tasks rather easily.

These medical appointment booking sites are the new hot trend and collectively serve millions of people across the world on daily basis. And their success clearly portrays how much potential this marketplace has for new players

For entrepreneurs looking forward to step into this booming marketplace, FATbit team has prepared this end-to-end guide to build an advanced doctor search & appointment scheduling website.

Let’s begin by understanding its business model first.

Business Model

First thing to understand here is that websites like Practo & ZocDoc are more than just healthcare professional & facility directories.These websites also allow patients to schedule appointments with doctors & clinics. Thus, it becomes imperative that besides providing a comprehensive listing of doctors & hospitals, your website also offers features that help healthcare professionals to manage appointments & their medical practice seamlessly.

How medical appointment scheduling platforms make money?

If we consider typical ecommerce ventures, then ideally these portals should charge healthcare professionals/clinics a commission for every appointment they get through the website. However, the prime revenue channel for such portals is offering subscription for the services they provide to healthcare professionals & facilities to help them manage their practice better and attract more patients.

For your doctor search & appointment scheduling clone website, you can offer different subscription plans on monthly & yearly basis depending on the audience you are serving.

Now, that we have acquired the insights related to the business model of medical appointment scheduling platforms, let’s move forward and list the essential features we need to include in its website script.

Website Features & Special Offerings

The idea behind this marketplace is to simplify doctor search and consultation appointment, and that’s exactly what your website should offer right from the start. Therefore, implementing the search tool box on the homepage banner would be the most mindful choice. Let’s discuss the search functionality in detail.

Doctor & Clinic Search

The search tool box of your website should have following important input fields:

• Location (area code or city)
• Doctor/clinic name
• Speciality

Note that 2nd & 3rd fields are mutually exclusive. So, either you can make them as optional input fields or use a single field that excepts both types of input values.

Doctor Search Result Page

Doctor search result pages should be packed with information and rich features. Here is the list of notable items for doctor search result page that you need to ensure in your clone website script:

• Doctor results with details like experience, specialties, location, consultation fee, clinic’s name, opening hours & photographs, number of feedbacks, and number of recommendations.
• Filter results based on locality, availability, opening hours, consultation fee, and whether instant online appointment booking is available or not.

Note here that for clinic results, you would have to play around a bit about which details to show and which not. For instance, exclude the consultation fee, include numbers of seating doctors, etc.

Doctor Profile Page

Doctor profile page should expand the details users see on the search listing, as well add new information. Notable items for the Doctor profile are:

• Doctor’s bio
• Practice address
• Clinic’s location in map view
• Clinic’s photographs
• Services/treatments offered
• Specializations
• Education
• Experience
• Awards & Recognitions
• Memberships
• Registrations
• Insurance offered
• Accepted payment options
• Option to share doctor profile on social media or through email
• Option to write a feedback
• A paginated tab that lists all the feedbacks doctor has received in past
• Breadcrumbs to easily navigate back and forth between result and profile

Clinic Profile Page

Clinic profile would be pretty much same as doctor profile, except for a couple of extra features and a different layout. Notable features for the clinic profile page include:

• Clinic rating
• Doctors who practice there

Lab Search & Profile

In addition to that, to make your platform more valuable, you can also offer the listing of test laboratories. You may maintain a separate module for that or integrate it with the Doctor & Clinic search. Notable features for the lab profile page are:

• Facilities available such as ‘Home sample pickup’, ‘Online Reports’, Credit /Debit card billing
• Accreditations
• Available tests and their prices

Adding such value-added features certainly boost your website’s conversion prospect.

Booking an appointment

Booking an appointment should be simple.There should a ‘Book Appointment’ button on the doctor/clinic profile page, as well as corresponding to each listing on the search result page. Clicking the booking button should be followed by a form that asks users following information:

• Patient’s name, age, sex
• Reason for appointment
• preferred timing
• contact information

Submitting this form should complete the appointment scheduling. The payment would be paid at the clinic.

Note: If you have included the commission cut on each booking in your business model, then you need to implement a payment gateway along with the booking form.

Also Read: Doctor Consultation and Search Website Guide: Business Model and Features

Patient Profile Options

To offer your patient some convenience, you should implement a sign-up process that allows them register through email as well as social media profiles. Patient dashboard should have following features:

• Health Records: Under this section, history of patient’s appointments, prescriptions, invoices, and medical report files would be stored
• Feedback: This tab would keep all the feedback a patient has provided for doctors in past.

Besides these, there should be the usual account management and profile setting options.

Other Notable Website features

To make your platform more valuable for your target audience, you should include following features in your doctor search & appointment scheduling script:

• A comprehensive Help section that has detailed articles & FAQs about your different offering
• A blog that features industry related post and whatever new is cooking at Practo.
• Customer support service through chat and over the phone.

Now, let’s discuss the features you can offer to doctors & clinics.

Practo for Doctors

Since doctors and medical facilities are your prime target to earn money from, you need to create a comprehensive medical practice management system for them, which should have following features & functionalities:

• Specify clinic timings & manage appointments
• Add new staff members (and doctors in case of clinic)
• Add new patient, as well as add patient to a group based on diagnosis
• Automatically generate unique IDs for patients for tidy record keeping
• Search patients from the patient database& access their entire electronic medical records, like tests, diagnosis, prescriptions, etc.
• Sync information across different devices and access anytime-anywhere
• Adding new clinic under the same practice, managing it, and linking it with existing ones

Expert Recommendations for Your Online Doctor Booking Clone Script

While the script features discussed so far will help you get up & run a successful online medical appointment scheduling platform, features discussed in this section will help you stand apart. So, let’s get going.

Also Read: Business Model, Clone Features and Script Requirements for Online Doctor Directory

Availability during Emergency Hours

Add a feature on the doctor & clinic profile page that let patients or their caretakers know whether the doctor or clinic offers to provide services for medical emergency situations. If yes, then timing for that.

Listing of Fitness & Wellness Professionals

You can turn your online doctor booking platform into total health solution by listing other health & wellness professionals such as fitness coaches, yoga teachers, dieticians, spa professionals, therapists, etc.

Compare Doctors/Clinics

Through this feature, you can empower people to make a more informed decision when doing a doctor or clinic search. They should be able to compare doctors & clinics based on services & facilities offered, experience, reviews, rating, qualification, etc.

Nearby Parking Availability

This yet another innovative marketplace feature that can help you assist your target audience better. On doctor/clinic page, also add a feature that tells users through map-view where they should be parking their cars.

So, these were some clues that you might want to use while building your online doctor scheduling clone website to give users a richer experience.

Introduce innovative marketplace features by understanding your customers’ needs
Discuss with Experts

Some Focus Areas to Become Successful

Doctors Database: Focus on Enhancing your Doctors Database. Help patients choose the best and nearest one doctor.

Doctors Authentication & History: Before getting a doctor onboard, ensure his authenticity and work history. Bad impression of doctor will directly impact website.

Attractive Subscription Packages to Doctors: Doctors look for best offers but it’s the major thing which drive revenues for website. So plan your subscription packages carefully

Discounts to Customers: To ensure booking from you portal, give users discounts as  a promotional offer.

Online Booking not for emergency services: Be clear, that online booking is  bad idea for emergency services. Provide users emergency contact details but not bookings.

Final Prescription

Undeniably, online doctor search & appointment scheduling platforms are the need of the hour in every local market. The real question for entrepreneurs who want to step into it is that how they are going to confront the challenge from the existing players. That is where the feature upgrades and suggestions we have made throughout the post can come handy.

If you want more suggestions to make you online healthcare venture successful, let us know. We will be glad to help you further.

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