A doctor appointment booking app is a marketplace on which patients search for a doctor by speciality and area, see the doctor's open slots and book one. It is also called an online doctor booking platform. Practo in India and Zocdoc in the United States are among the best-known. Many such apps also let the patient consult the doctor online instead of visiting.
A marketplace has two sides. On one side are patients, who search for free. On the other side are doctors and clinics, who list themselves on the app. The app earns money mainly from the doctors and clinics. They may pay a monthly fee, a fee for each booking, or a fee to appear higher in the search results. Some apps also sell clinics the software that runs their appointment book and billing, called practice management software.
Say a software engineer in Coimbatore wakes up with a painful red eye. She opens the app and searches for an eye specialist, an ophthalmologist, near her area. The app shows eight eye doctors within 5 km. For each one, it shows the consultation fee, such as ₹600, the doctor's qualifications and years of experience, patient reviews and the next free slot. She books a 6:30 p.m. slot with a doctor 2 km away. She gets a confirmation SMS at once, and a reminder an hour before. When she reaches the clinic, the receptionist already has her name on the day's list.
For this to work, the app must know each doctor's real free slots. A clinic also takes bookings by phone and from patients who walk in. If the app's book and the clinic's own book disagree, two patients arrive for the same slot. So the app connects to the clinic's software, and every booking updates both books. In a small Indian clinic, that software is often the app maker's own clinic software. In the United States, the app connects to the clinic's ambulatory EHR or its scheduling software.
Many apps offer an online consultation beside the visit in person. The patient then consults the doctor on a video or voice call, through a telemedicine app.
Reviews matter on these apps, because patients choose doctors partly by their ratings. So the app must check that each review comes from a patient who actually visited that doctor, for example by allowing reviews only after a booking.
How is a booking app different from a digital front door? A booking app lists doctors from many different clinics, which compete for the patient. A digital front door belongs to one hospital group, and sends patients only to that group's own doctors.