A user-friendly and reliable app in healthcare

Making it easier to request medicines

These days, in most circumstances, you don’t even have to leave the house to buy what you need – whether it's your weekly grocery shop or the new shoes that you wanted so badly. Ordered in a few clicks and delivered to your doorstep the next day. That made us wonder why accessing medication has to be so complicated. And why you shoud queue (during working hours) to pick your medication up from the pharmacy.

According to Nationale Apotheek, this process could be easier, quicker, and more user-friendly. But how? With this modern perspective on the pharmaceutical indistry, Nationale Apotheek called iO and asked us to develop an app that fits within a seamless customer journey. From the moment of medication prescription to delivery and aftercare.

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Challenge

Requesting medication online should be easier, faster, more personal and reliable

Solution

A user-friendly and reliable app that is accessible 24/7

About Nationale Apotheek

Nationale Apotheek is an online pharmacy that is part of the organisation APPO. Nationale Apotheek is committed to making it easier to request medicines in a more personal, fast, easy and safe way. The organisation makes this possible with a reliable app. In the app, people can request, change, repeat or cancel medicine orders in just a few clicks. For themselves, their children, parents or someone else they care for. The team of Nationale Apotheek always calls you to discuss the medication. After that, your order will be delivered to your home.

User research as the starting point

An app is always just a means to an end. It has to meet the users’ needs which is to get more convenient access to medication. Conducting thorough user research was essential.

We found that we could put everything we needed to meet those needs in an app. An app that offers all services online, in stark contrast with traditional pharmacies that are often much less advanced when it comes to digitalisation. An app that collects all information in one place, offering practical features and is always from the palm of your hand. Another benefit is that the security of sensitive data can be guaranteed.

A reliable app, that is always accessible

Data confidentiality and security were not only important for users. The pharmaceutical industry imposes strict requirements on companies. For instance, it requires a secure login procedure to give people access to their medical data at any time. To reliably procure this, we opted for DigiD as an identification method.

"We are the pharmacy in your pocket. Experience the convenience of online services with the personalized attention of a real pharmacy."

~ Nationale Apotheek

Practical functionalities

User research revealed that the target group prioritised practical features, such as quick access to the user’s history and a quick and easy ordering process. That required technology suitable for the development of flexible forms, lists and navigation structures. React Native provided us with the flexibility we needed and the added benefit of building an app for both Android and iOS devices simultaneously.

Everything in one place

The app brought data and functionalities together from different sources. To offer all services in one app, we had to develop links with external sources, and because many of these links involve the exchange of privacy-sensitive information, it was important that the links met the pharmaceutical industry’s security requirements.

Some of the links we included in the services are:

Personal identification
To identify new users online in a reliable way, we included DigiD, which makes a visit to a pharmacy with proof of identity redundant.
Updating personal data
To ensure that users can update personal information such as contact details independently, we added a link to the secure mail environment Zorgmail.
Requesting new and repeat prescriptions
We added a link to APRO, the pharmacy information system that manages all medication dispensation so that users could request new and repeat prescriptions.
Home delivery
User research revealed that consumers prefer home delivery. That is why Nationale Apotheek delivers medication free of charge. To realise this, we added a link to PostNL.

Reliable, scalable and secure data linking with AWS

To link all the data from the integrations with external resources, we used AWS because of the importance of encryption, secure connections and strict access management to the data. To do this, we relied on our reliable AWS infrastructure and implemented various AWS services:

The exchange of sensitive medical personal data between healthcare companies is managed over the E-Zorg network, a private network. To connect to it, we used AWS Direct Connect.
A secure environment is key for an organisation like Nationale Apotheek. One of the techniques we use for this purpose is an AWS Web Application Firewall (WAF). That technique automatically blocks suspicious traffic to the servers even before it can do any harm.
Scalability and redundancy are arranged with multiple EC2 instances behind an AWS Load Balancer and Amazon CloudFront. That enables the app to handle the growing number of users without additional costs. We also know that the app has no downtime because if one server goes down, there is always another available.

A blended approach

The Nationale Apotheek and iO collaboration extended through all phases of the project: from digital strategy to implementation and optimisation. We advised Nationale Apotheek as an independent partner, combining their knowledge and experience in the pharmaceutical industry with our insights on users and knowledge of technology, strategy, content & creation and marketing. The strength of this collaboration is that Nationale Apotheek can continue to focus on what they do best: managing and dispatching medication. Their strong performance has not gone unnoticed. The number of app users increases every month.