Secondary Research

Competitive Analysis

Comparing frequently-used and top-ranking medical enterprise application’s that use patient portals.

The most successful competitor sites seem to have straightforward navigation, calls to action, and colloquial jargon (Jakob’s Law). They have a simple payment system that shows current balances and enough detail for the patient to know if it has been paid previously or is in need of payment.

The sites that go the extra mile and show insurance payments and adjustments help show patient responsibility clearly and that insurance (s) have been billed (visibility of system status). These applications also even allow for paying certain amounts on specific dates of service with different cards. They have successfully allowed the user to have autonomy and assurance of correctness- the guesswork is gone.

Why Competitive Analysis?

The applications and plugins chosen for the competitive analysis were due to their overall ranking on g2.com. MyChart’s leading competitor’s patient portal layouts, features, and UI were gleaned from public facing sites and were not readily available due to the proprietary nature of these applications.

Positive Shared Qualities

  • Clear calls to action
  • Well laid out content
  • Recognizable jargon
  • Thought out processes and views

Negative Shared Qualities

  • Overreliance on iconography
  • Medical terminology
  • Limited functionality
  • Dated interface design

Important Distinctions and Definitions

There are three kinds of competitors taken into account for this competitive analysis: direct competitors and two kinds of indirect competitors for MyChart.

Direct Competitors were those patient portals put forth by large enterprise applications like EPIC, a healthcare software company. These are generally used by large hospital networks and require a lot of customization to work to meet the needs of the large variety of end users from medical staff to registration to accounts receivable to patients.

Indirect competitors (Type 1) were those applications used by practices or specialty clinics that did not participate in a larger network and were just billing out for their practice ie they are medical practice management platform combining electronic health record (EHR) / electronic medical record (EMR) capabilities with front office automation and workforce scheduling, medical billing, and advanced revenue reporting capabilities.

Indirect competitors (Type 2) were plugins that were marketed to help with the customer experience gaps that generally were not being met by the previous types of applications or content management system (CMS). Plugins generally are very specific add-ons,with limited capabilities that can make a CMS more robust, customized, and functional.

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