Health Comes First: What Dhanteras Reminds Product Teams
Dhanteras falls on Friday, 6 November this year. It is the first of the five days of Diwali, and for many families it is the day the house is cleaned, the lamps are set out and something new is bought.
Underneath the shopping there is an older idea. Dhanteras is also known as Dhanvantari Jayanti, after Dhanvantari, the physician of Hindu tradition. Before the lights, before the sweets, before the money, the festival begins with health.
An old order of priorities
It is easy to say "health is wealth" and move on. It is harder to notice that a festival about prosperity chose to start its calendar with a physician, and not with a purchase.
We think that ordering is worth holding on to. It is the same question we ask at the start of every product at SystemOnSilicon: what would this look like if health really came first?
What that means for a health product
Asking that question tends to produce a short list of habits.
Be personal. A health app that treats everyone as an average user is guessing. People differ in history, diet, language, routine and what they are comfortable sharing. A good product starts from the person, not from the feature list.
Be simple. Health decisions are often made when someone is tired, worried or short of time. The screen that helps is the one that does not ask them to think twice.
Be there when it matters. Reminders, summaries and records are not exciting, but they are the parts people lean on. A product earns trust by being steady in the moments that are not exciting.
Be careful with trust. Health information is some of the most personal information there is. Asking for it is a responsibility. We try to explain plainly what we need and why.
How this shows up in our products
Each of our products takes one of those habits as its starting point.
- Tanaya is a women's wellness companion with a personal health profile, period tracking and reminders.
- RiteFood is a personalized nutrition platform that builds plans around the person, not the average.
- OneHealth Digital brings records, appointments and follow-ups together for hospitals and clinics.
- MenGO is a private place for men to find reliable information about personal health.
None of them replaces a doctor, and none of them pretends to. They are there to make the next step a little easier to take.
A small thing to do this Dhanteras
When the lamps are lit, take a minute for something that is easy to postpone: a check-up you have been meaning to book, a family member you have not asked about lately, a medicine cabinet that needs sorting. It does not need to be large. It only needs to come first.
Wishing you and your family a healthy festival season.
Learn more about what we build at https://www.systemonsilicon.com.
