Middle East Telehealth 2022
A First Look at Virtual Visit Technology

Okadoc’s Strong Relationships & Microsoft’s Technology Distinguish Them from Group of High-Performing Vendors

All measured vendors perform highly, and customers feel the solutions meet their basic needs for virtual visits. Okadoc receives the top overall score due to strong partnership and collaboration. They started in online scheduling and provider-search technology but pivoted to virtual care during the pandemic, and their small but growing client base highlights the vendor’s customer-focused approach and willingness to go above and beyond to help customers optimize the system. The product is differentiated by healthcare-specific functionality and integration; respondents report significant reductions in no-show rates thanks to automated notifications. However, customers feel Okadoc could continue to streamline their offerings and make them easier to use. Based on KLAS’ research last year during the pandemic, Microsoft Teams was the most broadly used telehealth solution in the Middle East, partially because many organizations already had Microsoft licenses. The video conferencing platform is set apart by its high quality and reliability; customers emphasize that the simple setup, easy EMR integration, and strong clinician and patient usability make Teams easy to adopt and give it longevity. The customer experience is dampened by weak support and a lack of partnership; respondents note that while there are some basic support structures, Microsoft does not provide much additional help or proactive outreach.

Limited Data for Neev Tech Labs & Zoom Provides Preliminary Insights into Performance

Neev Tech Labs is relatively new to the market; KLAS interviewed three respondents, who represent all the vendor’s live customers in the UAE at the time of data collection. The limited number of respondents report a high level of responsiveness and collaboration, stating that the vendor provides good relationships and actively works to meet the shifting needs of their small client base. Through their virtual care platform, Neev Tech Labs offers healthcare-specific features, such as online bookings and screening questionnaires. Customers like the vendor’s willingness to listen to and tackle many different ideas but note that the technology is limited, partly due to its newness—it lacks some of the robustness of more-focused virtual care platforms. In contrast, customers of Zoom (limited data) rate the product’s quality high. Zoom primarily offers tried-and-true video conferencing capabilities with some additional functionality, like waiting rooms. At the start of the pandemic, customers were able to quickly adopt the Zoom platform due to its strong usability and users’ familiarity with it. Despite this, Zoom has already been replaced by some customers who felt the vendor didn’t offer the desired level of EMR integration. Respondents additionally note that training is weak.

Customers Find Microsoft & Zoom (Limited Data) Often Lack Personal Touch During Implementation & Training

Healthcare organizations in the Middle East report less implementation and training support from the larger video conferencing vendors, Microsoft and Zoom. Customers of Microsoft (limited data) describe being left to themselves to figure out how to get Teams up and running. While customers can get help during that process, some choose not to—one respondent opted out of Microsoft-provided training because of the cost. Customers of Zoom (limited data) note the vendor has readily available training materials but takes more of a hands-off approach to implementations. Conversely, Okadoc and Neev Tech Labs are rated higher for their implementation and training processes. Respondents highlight that Okadoc guides customers through the implementation, actively engages key stakeholders, and provides exceptional training. Customers of Neev Tech Labs (limited data) report a few hiccups tied to implementations but say the vendor helped them work through any small issues they encountered.

How Do EMR Vendors Factor into Virtual Visits?

About This Report

Each year, KLAS interviews thousands of healthcare professionals about the IT solutions and services their organizations use. For this report, interviews were conducted over the last 18 months using KLAS’ standard quantitative evaluation for healthcare software, which is composed of 16 numeric ratings questions and 4 yes/no questions, all weighted equally. Combined, the ratings for these questions make up the overall performance score, which is measured on a 100-point scale. The questions are organized into six customer experience pillars—culture, loyalty, operations, product, relationship, and value.

Sample Sizes

Unless otherwise noted, sample sizes displayed throughout this report (e.g., n=6) represent the total number of unique customer organizations interviewed for a given vendor or solution. However, it should be noted that to allow for the representation of differing perspectives within any one customer organization, samples may include surveys from different individuals at the same organization. The table below shows the total number of unique organizations interviewed for each vendor or solution as well as the total number of individual respondents.

Some respondents choose not to answer particular questions, meaning the sample size for any given vendor or solution can change from question to question. When the number of unique organization responses for a particular question is less than 6, the score for that question is marked with an asterisk (*) or otherwise designated as “limited data.” If the sample size is less than 3, no score is shown. Note that when a vendor has a low number of reporting sites, the possibility exists for KLAS scores to change significantly as new surveys are collected.