Welcome to our latest feature in our Life at LetsGetChecked series. This time around, we’re offering insight into the technology, data, and analytics behind LetsGetChecked by speaking to those that work alongside it each day.
This week, we spoke with Ronan Treacy, our Software Engineering Team Lead. Ronan spoke to us about what makes LetsGetChecked’s approach to technology in the medical industry stand out from the crowd and the biggest advantages technology has brought to medical care.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and your career journey to date.
I’ve always had an interest in building things and figuring out how they work. I studied physics at UCD but a career in science didn’t really interest me. The course involved some programming which I enjoyed so I decided to pursue a career in software. I started as an intern in a small software development company in Dublin and haven’t looked back since. What I enjoy about software development is that you constantly have new problems to solve, especially when the solutions you come up with can have a real-world impact.
When did your interest in MedTech begin?
My previous role before starting at LetsGetChecked was at a company that worked on both healthcare data analysis for the Irish department of health and rare disease registries which allowed clinicians and patients to track the health of patients and share data to improve patient outcomes. I saw firsthand how the use of technology can improve clinical outcomes in an industry that has historically been reluctant to adopt new technology. Moving to LetsGetChecked gave me the opportunity to be part of building a world leader in patient-centric healthcare technology.
How is LetsGetChecked working towards building an IT architecture that can adapt to such a fast-paced and evolving environment?
At an organizational level, LetsGetChecked has been able to continue to evolve and adapt because we are constantly striving to analyze and improve our structures, processes, and service offerings. We have an open and collaborative working environment where feedback from everybody is not only welcome but encouraged. From a software perspective, we are very focused on balancing speed and scale and have invested the time to build the platform the right way so that we can continue to grow and add additional functionality in the future.
What makes LetsGetChecked's approach to technology in the medical industry different from other companies?
One of the big things that sets us apart from our competitors is that we aim to own as much of our end-to-end product offering as possible. So everything from labs and clinical care to production and dispatch is under our control. This approach presents lots of interesting problems to solve from a software perspective as all of these parts of the business need their own tools and applications but it also allows us to be hugely adaptable to a fast-changing market. It also enables us to be very proactive and be a market leader rather than just trying to emulate what our competitors may already be offering.
Another differentiator we have from traditional medical services is how patient-centric our platform is, as we do not face the same limitations of access that in-person services can lead to. We focus on what is best and easiest from the patient’s perspective rather than always looking at care from the clinician’s point of view.
In your opinion, how has technology shaped the future of medical services? And, what is the biggest advantage it has over more traditional medical care?
What we have built so far in my time at LetsGetChecked and what we are planning to build in the foreseeable future are game changers for the medical industry. The control, convenience, and accessibility we offer patients make it so much easier for our patients to access timely care and are really allowing us to fulfill our mission statement of enabling people to live longer, happier lives.
What implementations do we have in place in LetsGetChecked to maximize productivity?
The scalability of our platform along with the previously mentioned end-to-end control of our services and the collaboration we have not just across teams but across departments allow us to keep expanding our service and grasping new opportunities in a really efficient manner. We have been very successful at building a team that takes pride in and ownership of their work and empower them to solve problems so when something needs to get done we can have the utmost confidence that our team will deliver.
What is the most exciting aspect of working with LetsGetChecked?
Working with great people to solve complicated problems that are genuinely improving people’s lives. We hear stories all the time about people who used our services being diagnosed and were able to get treatment for conditions that if they hadn’t been found could easily have been fatal but weren’t as a result of LetsGetChecked and the work we’ve done. That’s a real-world impact that not a lot of roles can offer.
Where do you see MedTech five years from now and where will we fit in?
To be honest I have no idea and that’s one of the great things about the industry. Even planning a year or two ahead has been impossible up until now as new opportunities continue to come up all the time but I’m sure that wherever the industry is in five years we will continue to be a leading innovator in the industry.
