UAT Best Practices: Optimizing the Healthcare Software Launch

The best healthcare software solutions integrate into existing workflows, reduce the time needed to perform manual tasks, store information in a secure, user-friendly way, and make life easier for healthcare workers. KPIs should revolve around the user, so today, we’re sharing five UAT best practices from the Vitamin team to make your software tick these boxes.

In healthcare software development, we measure the success of our solutions by their impact on real-life users. Implementing good software UAT practices lets you get there.

During UAT, real users — like doctors, nurses, admins, or patients — use the software to see whether it does what it’s supposed to and if it’s easy to navigate. They test it out in ways they would use it in their daily work or life, so any bugs appear and can be fixed before your app is officially out there.

Join us to discover tips for making this process as valuable as possible.

How Does UAT Support the Healthcare Software Launch?

When the first draft of a healthcare solution is complete, the development team enters the pre-launch stage. It involves finalizing the features, refining the UI, and conducting tests to ensure all functions as planned and there are no bugs in the code. This phase also includes user acceptance testing.

User acceptance testing supports the launch of your healthcare software by validating its functionality. It lets you check if your products solve real problems and aid the end-users. Plus, it collects real-life feedback, offering pointers for potential improvement.

Software UAT also instills confidence in users, which is a major perk in the slow-to-digitize healthcare industry. This step demonstrates the software has been tailored to medical workers’ needs.

5 Best Practices for Healthcare SaaS User Acceptance Testing

How do you perform user acceptance testing? The basics are simple: get prototypical users in the room, have them use software, and record their insights. From our 60+ successful projects, we found several UAT best practices that make our products more reliable. Here are some you may integrate:

1. Know what the users are thinking. Understanding the user perspective lets you create software that meets their needs. Since rarely any healthcare software company has doctors on hand, it’s a good idea to involve end-users from the early stages of development. This guarantees their insights get integrated into the platform, aligning it with their expectations. We at Vitamin always have a domain expert in the room while planning our apps — a hospital administrator, doctor, payer, or patient.
2. Check performance under load. Conduct software UAT under simulated production loads to assess scalability. See how the system performs under peak usage conditions, like busy clinic hours or high-volume patient registrations, to identify potential bottlenecks or performance issues. At these times, a healthcare platform really mustn’t be slow or buggy.
3. Know your acceptance criteria. Acceptance criteria define a successful outcome for the software UAT. You should establish them collaboratively with stakeholders and have them reflect the desired functionality, performance, and usability. Define the checkboxes early and have the use cases you’re testing reflect them.
4. Test the edge cases, too. Test the app with extreme scenarios to ensure your solution is robust and resilient. Consider unusual inputs, unexpected user behaviors, and uncommon system configurations that may lead to glitches or failures. Addressing edge cases enhances the app’s reliability and prepares it for real-world usage in healthcare settings, where errors can be disastrous.
5. Prepare for disaster scenarios. Your testing should include a scenario of disaster recovery for your healthcare software. Simulate situations like data loss, system failures, or network outages to check if your backup and recovery are easy to execute. That way, you guarantee minimal disruption to patient care once the app is in the real world, even if it malfunctions.

Pro tip: Even detailed UAT won’t catch all errors — some issues are only fixable during maintenance. Implement feedback mechanisms like in-app surveys, feedback forms, and user forums to gather input and preferences. This information will be invaluable for iterations and improvements.

Bonus: User Acceptance Testing Checklist

A user acceptance testing checklist can be a lifesaver. It’s a simple step-by-step template that confirms you’re covering all the bases:

• Draft a concept. Know what you’re supposed to test for and what results you expect. Do so with the aid of your development and QA teams.
• Determine how many people will perform user acceptance testing on your healthcare software and how. It could be in-person, over Zoom sessions, or through an app.
• Have a data collection strategy. Establish a way for testers to report issues in real-time. Set up a sheet or dashboard to collect them.
• Know how to evaluate acceptance criteria. Determine what constitutes a successful test and be honest about whether you passed it.
• Prepare a mitigation plan. A software UAT will likely illuminate some bugs your team has missed, so determine ways to address them.
• Do another round of user acceptance testing. Have a workflow that allows multiple tests until you’ve ironed out all the kinks — if there’s one UAT best practice you remember, let it be this one.

This user acceptance testing checklist offers a comprehensive view of software performance in real-life circumstances.

What UAT Innovations Can You Leverage?

We’ve discussed UAT best practices based on methodology, but technology can take it to the next level. We’d like to highlight automation, crowdsourced testing, AR, and VR.

Implement automation tools like Testsigma to streamline repetitive testing tasks and speed up software UAT. Automated testing executes use cases efficiently, improves test coverage, and detects defects early in development. AI-powered UAT adapts to user feedback and behaviors.

Crowdsourced testing platforms like StarDust Testing engage diverse healthcare professionals, patients, and domain experts. It gives you feedback from a broad user base, letting you identify usability issues, edge cases, and performance bottlenecks that may not be apparent to in-house testers.

To go a step further into modern tech, explore AR and VR to simulate real-world healthcare environments and scenarios during UAT. They create immersive testing scenarios, letting users interact with the platform in a realistic way.

User-Centric Healthcare SaaS, Successful Healthcare SaaS

User acceptance testing aligns healthcare software with real users’ needs. By following UAT best practices, your team will be ready to launch solutions that boost healthcare workflows and patient outcomes.

Have these takeaways with you the next time you near the release date:

• Put yourself in healthcare workers’ shoes. Understand your users’ needs by thinking like them. This helps create software that genuinely improves their work lives.
• Involve users early. Engage users to match the software to their expectations. In the ideal case, have the prototypical end-user involved in the planning stage.
• Set clear goals. Establish clear KPIs for your software solution, using input from all stakeholders to determine the definition of success.
• Plan tests carefully. Create detailed test scenarios to cover all aspects of the software and various use cases.
• Be ready for bugs. Develop a plan for reporting and fixing bugs. They’re inevitable, but being prepared makes debugging smoother.

Struggling to align your healthcare software with real-life prospective users? Schedule a consultation and have our Business Analyst poke at your proposed solution. We at Vitamin excel at solving business needs with tech solutions: we can help you do the same.