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Custom App Spotlight: Vinitial

The AppPresser team develops custom apps for clients who need great performance and custom features. Custom apps go beyond the current capabilities of AppPresser products, Learn more here.

Let’s say you play soccer on the weekends, and last Sunday you tweaked your back for the 3rd time. You visit your physical therapist to get checked out, because you figure you need more than ice and advil this time.

He fixes you up, scolds you for slide tackling at your age, and sends you on your way with a list of exercises.

You wake up the next day and start on your prescribed workout, and all of a sudden get a shooting pain up your spine. Wouldn’t it be great if you could just text your doctor and get an immediate response, instead of scheduling another appointment and waiting in pain for 2 days?

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That’s exactly what Vinitial allows you to do.

Vinitial is a messaging app for healthcare providers and their clients to be able to communicate outside the appointment office.

Providers can now keep better tabs on their patients, and patients can have faster access to their providers, all without using up your cell phone texting limits. It’s a win win!

Of course, we are developers, so we also get really excited about how the app is built.

Below you can learn about the unique tools we used to make the app, and why that matters for both developers and clients.


Why using WordPress as a backend for mobile apps is awesome

Vinitial uses WordPress as a back end for it’s app, which is awesome in so many ways. It saves time and money, it works great, and clients love it.

WordPress basically becomes a UI for handling the data in the app, a place where the client can go and control what is happening visually. In Vinitial’s case, this is great for managing users, registration, roles, and more.

If you didn’t use WordPress, you would still have to use some other framework, or build a custom UI for your client to manage users and app data. Using WordPress allows the app to be built in less time, and for less money.

Vinitial integrates with BuddyPress, which provides a lot of the functionality needed in an app like this. For example, you can login to WordPress and see a registered users profile, and even change their role (to provider for example).

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This app was built using a hybrid mobile app framework, the WordPress JSON REST API, and Phonegap. We added custom BuddyPress endpoints to the REST API to add friend requests, private messaging, and more in this app.

The app is lightning fast, can be viewed while offline, integrates push notifications, login authentication, and more.

We had a great time building Vinitial, and working with WordPress in new and exciting ways.

6 Comments

  1. Nick Ciske (@nciske) on July 22, 2014 at 1:03 pm

    Curious what the HIPPA implications are and what steps (if any) you had to take to handle those with WordPress/BuddyPress as the backend (e.g. hosting, data privacy, etc)?

    • Scott Bolinger on July 22, 2014 at 1:35 pm

      Hey Nick, I’m happy to chat with you about this, but a comment thread might not be the best place. Hit me up on skype anytime 🙂

      • David on August 12, 2014 at 11:49 pm

        Hey there, I am just wondering if I can customise this app to fit being used as a messager for an online community, not necessarily doctor-related?



      • Scott Bolinger on August 13, 2014 at 12:51 pm

        Hi David, we could definitely do that for you as a custom app, but it’s not something you can do yourself. Feel free to email us to discuss your project: http://apppresser.com/custom-apps/

        Thanks!



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  3. […] RT @apppresser: Did you know we make custom apps? Check out Vinitial, a messaging app that uses WordPress apppresser.com/custom-app-spo… […]

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