We see a consistent demand for eggPlant across many markets including defense, retail and finance. But one area that has really caught our eye over the last 12 months is healthcare, and medical devices. In these markets software isn’t just mission critical, it can often prove life critical. And yet despite this, between 2005 and 2009, 113 medical devices were recalled from the market – a scary thought, and a source of reputational damage and liability for medical companies. Crucially, more than a fifth of these medical and healthcare device recalls were due to poor software testing.
The challenge in these markets will continue to grow as more medical devices come to market and more software is embedded within those medical devices. We’re witnessing more lines of code, more complexity, more sophisticated user interfaces, and also an increase in medical devices designed to run on mobile devices - an area in which TestPlant has vast experience. All of this is underpinned by continuing growth in regulation and compliance.
Furthermore, the use of Electronic Health Records (EHRs) has doubled over the past two years, despite the fact that only a third of medical institutions in the US have implemented an EHR system to date. Associated challenges include how to create, test and manage software that meets government regulations and provides interoperability while improving services to the uses, as well as the necessity to deliver systems quickly to market. On top of this, there is the ever-growing problem of selecting a test system that can span the whole range of mobile devices now being used within medical institutions.
This is where eggPlant excels, and why we’re currently seeing such a strong demand in the healthcare market. Our technology is easy to use, features simple yet powerful scripting, and takes an innovative image-recognition based approach to testing – crucial in ensuring that the user interface for medical devices, health records, or results shown on mobile devices, are consistent.
Another great benefit of eggPlant is the fact that it’s completely non-invasive. This provides peace of mind, security and a level of practicality that greatly appeals to medical and health testers. Because it is also universal, it is also able to work across legacy, desktop, mobile devices, operating systems and browsers – functionality which we know is very important in markets such as healthcare that uses a broad range of new and legacy systems.
At TestPlant, we know that software testing can feel particularly demanding in the healthcare industry, which is why we are always working to stay ahead of the latest unique testing challenges. Just last week, one of our healthcare consultants, Laura Hickling, was joined by eggPlant systems engineer Karin Stewart in a TestPlant webinar specifically organized to review some of the emerging market trends and to demonstrate eggPlant’s breadth, depth and capability in supporting healthcare test professionals.
If you would like to learn more about TestPlant’s commitment to ensuring that critical healthcare applications and devices always run smoothly and efficiently, getting touch. Click here.
