Nomad Health
Transforming a struggling patient portal into a best-in-class healthcare experience that increased online bookings by 170% and reduced provider admin work by more than half.
Transforming a struggling patient portal into a best-in-class healthcare experience that increased online bookings by 170% and reduced provider admin work by more than half.
A patient portal that was failing patients and burning out providers.
The original patient portal was slow, confusing, and unintuitive. It had a 22% appointment no-show rate—nearly triple the industry standard. Patients actively avoided using it, calling in instead to book appointments and handle administrative tasks. The portal felt outdated and didn't match the quality of care patients expected from Nomad Health.
Providers were spending 3+ hours per day on administrative tasks due to the poorly designed system. Manual appointment management, patient communication workflows, and scheduling conflicts meant less time with patients. The provider dashboard was cluttered and lacked actionable insights, forcing doctors to hunt for critical patient information.
The original portal was built by an overseas contract shop with poor code quality and outdated architecture. Built on a legacy MongoDB database with spaghetti code, it was slow and difficult to maintain. Data integrity issues and lack of proper testing meant every change risked breaking something else.
The poor UX directly impacted Nomad Health's growth metrics. Call center volume was high, reducing operational efficiency. Patient satisfaction scores lagged behind competitors. The company needed a complete overhaul to compete in the healthtech space and scale their operations.
Understanding the real problems through human-centered discovery.
We conducted 15 in-depth interviews with active patients and analyzed call center logs to understand pain points. Key insight: patients wanted simple, fast booking with clear appointment confirmations and reminders.
We spent two days shadowing providers as they used the portal. We watched them struggle with scheduling conflicts, hunt for patient history, and manually send reminders. This revealed the real workflow friction points that the UI wasn't addressing.
We created detailed journey maps for both patient and provider workflows. This revealed moments of frustration, duplicate work, and unnecessary steps. The maps became the blueprint for our redesign priorities and helped stakeholders understand the problems quantitatively.
Before and after: how we simplified the experience.
How we built it to last.
Built a modern React application with TypeScript for type safety. Designed responsive interfaces for mobile-first experience, critical for patients booking on-the-go. Implemented real-time updates using WebSocket connections for live calendar availability.
Created a new FastAPI backend with clean architecture and comprehensive test coverage. Designed RESTful APIs that separate concerns between patient, provider, and admin endpoints. Implemented proper authentication and authorization for HIPAA compliance.
Migrated all patient data from legacy MongoDB to PostgreSQL with zero downtime. Created validation scripts to ensure data integrity during migration. Built audit logging to track all data changes for compliance and debugging purposes.
Integrated Twilio for SMS appointment reminders that reduced no-shows. Connected SendGrid for professional email communications. Built webhook systems for real-time notifications and event-driven architecture.
Implemented Redis caching for frequently accessed data like appointment availability. Optimized database queries to reduce load times. Added CDN for static assets and images. Achieved 95+ Lighthouse scores.
Comprehensive testing strategy with unit tests, integration tests, and end-to-end tests. User acceptance testing with real providers and patients. Performance testing to ensure scalability. Security audits for HIPAA compliance.
Numbers that tell the story of transformation.
Our patients used to dread dealing with us online. Now they tell us our portal is the easiest healthcare experience they've had. NextDay transformed our entire patient relationship—this wasn't just a redesign, it was a business transformation.
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