Blood Pressure Diary by MedM - Interview with the developer of a fantastic app

Did you have any prior development or coding experience?

Yes. Denis graduated from the St. Petersburg State University in 1999, but started working for a software development company as early as 1995. He turned to mobile software when Palm was still a thing :) And as part of SPB Software - a world leader in Windows Mobile apps development - Denis built a lineup of exquisite software products. After the company was successfully sold to a Russian search engine giant Yandex, Denis co-founded MedM, with a dream of making connected health easy and accessible to all.

What was the most challenging aspect of developing mobile app?

Connected, is the most difficult part of the "connected health" thing. Healthcare is complex and expensive enough for parties involved to not be easily susceptible to rapid change or particularly adventurous in forging new partnerships. From the start, MedM wanted to make software that would work if not with most, then with ALL possible medical sensors. And this proved to be the most challenging part. This goal was complex enough in engineering, but the business side of things was even more difficult. Today, MedM apps work with nearly 600 mobile medical devices. We have built a solution that collects data from peripheral sensors automatically, using the Bluetooth communication protocol. And we invest heavily into building lasting relationships with OEMs and ODMs making medical devices for the mass market.

_{Denis Khitrov}

Denis Khitrov is the CEO of MedM. He had decades of development experience under his belt before he started this company. This interview with Denis was made possible with the special efforts of Victoria Krasilshikova, the Director of Marketing and Communication at MedM.

Name a few of your favorite apps and reason you love them.

Duolingo is my number one favorite app :) It motivates me to come back to language learning again in again. And the studying itself is presented in a fun way, so it is actually easy to enjoy the process. I am fond of WhatsApp, a solid communication tool. And, of course, Instagram is superb, very nicely done.

How long have you been working on this app?

It took us only about 3 months to actually build the MedM Blood Pressure app (and we built it on the basis of MedM Health), but it took over 5 years to make it the app it is today. By experience, from 80 to 90% of an app's lifecycle is actually support. We cherish our users wishes and preferences, we constantly keep working on making the app better.

What need of the user did you have in mind when developing this app?

These are the concepts we had in mind when making this app: Save time for our users, make it possible to log medical data efficiently and accurately, preferably automatically. We also wanted to give people the freedom and decide if they want to not create a user account and opt for storing all their data offline, directly on the smartphone. Our users are also free to choose manual data entry, bypassing the automatic data collection model all together. And last, but not least, we wanted to make it possible for people to share their health data effortlessly, with the people they trust: family and healthcare professionals.

In what way do you think your app is better than similar apps on the market? Please describe in detail what innovation you think you bring and what you are proud of in your app.

Nobody can match MedM’s number of supported medical devices. MedM PB offers unique optimized hand entry of data. It takes seconds to make new medical records.

What are your future plans and expected features of the coming new versions of this app?

MedM apps will have more and better reports. We are constantly adding new devices and possibly next year, in 2022, we will pass the 1000 supported devices mark. We will perfect our system of reminders and offer seamless syncing with Google Fit and Apple Health, meaning reading and writing both ways.

Assuming new users of your app are reading this page. What do you want to ask them to do (contact you about X, Share the app, etc.)?

Try our MedM Health app, it is the single most connected mobile app available to iOS and Android users today. The app works with hundreds of devices, in over a dozen languages, and capable of logging all physiological parameters. https://www.medm.com/apps/health/