Remember when the family physician was on call for home visits? A new app aims to bring that practice back—and more.
Aide, an app conceptualized and developed by three siblings—Dr. Patrick Bugayong, Pamela Bugayong-Donato and Paolo Bugayong—is a home medical care app designed to cater to the entire family, including your pets.
“We developed this app when we couldn’t find a nurse for our grandmother,” Pamela said. “We thought, wouldn’t it be great if there was a convenient way of finding medical practitioners?”
Now live on Android (iOS is expected to be up and running within the month), Aide has more than 500 medical practitioners and over 600 users.
All the users need to do is write down their profile and medical history, including the entire family if they wish, click on which services they need, view the profiles of the medical practitioners—including CVs and their ratings—and book an appointment.
There’s a P130 fee for booking that will be charged to the users’ credit card. That’s about equivalent to a one-way cab ride to the hospital. But beyond the money saved from the booking fee is being spared the hassle of going to the hospital and waiting for hours in long queues with other sick people.
“Let the doctors come to you… What we’re doing is empowering the patients to choose their medical practitioner,” said Patrick.
Services offered by Aide include Medical, Nursing Care, Physical Therapy, Animal Care, Diagnostics, Interpret My Labs, Other Services such as caregivers.
Doctors, nurses and diagnostic centers are carefully screened by the siblings to make sure everyone is legit.
Medical history
How exactly does the app work? Start by creating your profile and medical history. (You can also choose to input your children’s, spouse’s, parent’s, and pet’s respective profiles—the entire household in one nifty app.) Then choose from several symptoms (ambulatory or outpatient cases only, so you won’t see anything close to a heart attack). You can even tick off different body parts that you think need medical attention.
“This is to help the doctors see your case,” said Paolo.
Once you’re done with your profile, the app searches for the appropriate specialist to see; it has listings covering everything from general practitioners to pulmonologists, nephrologists to pediatricians, orthopedics to surgeons.
After the app goes through the list, the patient can now view the specialists’ profiles, CVs, ratings and professional fees. Professional fees are on cash basis, paid directly to the medical practitioner.
But beyond the money saved from the booking fee is being spared the hassle of going to the hospital and waiting for hours in long queues with other sick people.
“We have nothing to do with the professional fees. What Aide provides is a platform for patient and doctor to meet. How they build that relationship will be entirely up to them,” said Patrick.
Professional fees range from P500 to P5,000—depending on the qualifications. Pamela said a patient once requested for a nurse for a day, but she was so happy with the service she booked the nurse for the entire month and paid the nurse a generous P50,000.
Surprisingly, the most in-demand service are vets, followed by doctors, nurses and physical therapists.
“There are around 2 million animal lovers in Metro Manila alone,” Patrick said.
Medical practitioners, subject to approval, will have to subscribe to Aide to become a part of the list. Subscription fees are P2,000 quarterly; P3,200 semi-quarterly; and P5,000 annually (or less than P600 a month).
Another feature is diagnostics. Blood extraction can now be performed right in your home, making those procedures that require fasting very convenient. Results will be e-mailed.
“All you need to do is wake up,” Patrick said.
Executive checkups can now also be performed in the comfort of your house.
“We have packages for frequently requested tests, like dengue, for example, so that if you suspect you might have dengue, you don’t need to go through all the questionnaires. We have packages for cancer screening, diarrhea, a diabetes workup that follows WHO (World Health Organization) guidelines,” Patrick said.
Every area in the metropolis has at least one medical practitioner, making it convenient for both doctor and patient.
“What we have is a two-prong business model. Medical practitioners have access to numerous Filipinos in the country, and they become more productive. They gain more experience, they are always busy. It’s cost-efficient since it’s all on the phone. Users also see who they’re about to book, there’s transparency on the price, and convenience,” said Paolo.
Next step for Aide is to make the app available in Cebu, Iloilo and Davao.
Aide hotline 09178068478; visit aide-app.com; follow on Facebook and Instagram @Aideapp.
