In order to optimize the patient experience, it’s important that the medical industry is user-centric rather than tech-centric. Gone are the days when each part of the medical device design process took place in a silo. In order to provide the best patient care, all components of the device development team (medical, software, electrical, mechanical) need to work together. This means a number of people will be coming together from different backgrounds, mainly programming and medical.
Programmers are changing the way they do things when it comes to developing a software product with the end goal of providing the ultimate user experience. They are working more closely with medical teams and becoming more aware of how they can impact patients by doing so. The main changes include:
- continuous integration
- use of appropriate language
- change management
Continuous Integration
When you have a team of experts in the software development field working with experts in the medical field, you may end up with specialists who know a lot about their own field but next to nothing about the other field. Here’s where continuous integration comes in.
Continuous integration is the process of merging everybody’s work frequently and conducting tests to ensure things are going as planned. When it comes to software development projects, it’s highly recommended that there is a controlled version of the source code so changes and progress can be monitored accurately.
Use Appropriate Language
Language is another area where all parties on the medical device software development team may not have the same knowledge. Programming language might not mean anything to medical experts and medical language may not mean anything to programmers. It’s important that everyone working on the project use language that is easily understood by other team members.
In addition to using language, everyone on the software development team can understand, it’s also important to explain why you are doing certain things so all team members are kept informed and can vary any actions they may take in response to new developments.
Product Data Management
When there are multiple people working on a software development project, it’s extremely important to monitor and control changes so the reported results are accurate. This includes things like analyzing necessary changes, announcing when a change will be made, giving the change a name so it’s easy to track, and recording any feedback as a result of the change. This can be accomplished most effectively through a product data management system.
In order for medical device software companies to be competitive, they will need to provide the ultimate patient experience. It’s important that medical device software development teams consist of both programming and medical experts. By using language all team members understand, continually integrating processes, and managing change in a way that allows the team to be prepared for and accurately track changes, medical device software development teams will ensure their software provides the best patient experience.
Pivot International is a product design, development, and manufacturing firm with specializations in software development, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and industrial design. To learn more about our custom software development services and how we can help you with your medical device software, contact us today.
