What is the BeterDichtbij Professional app?

The BeterDichtbij Professional app is built for healthcare workers. Where the BeterDichtbij app already allowed patients to chat with their doctor, the Professional app now serves the other side of the conversation. It gives doctors, nurses, and support staff back control over their working day.

Healthcare still runs largely on phone calls. Disruptive, time-consuming, and hard to plan around. BeterDichtbij chose a different model: asynchronous communication, built directly into care pathways. Messages sent automatically at the right moment. Information patients can read at their own pace. Contact without requiring a care provider to be immediately available.

As easy to use as WhatsApp, but built entirely for healthcare.

The role of Evers + de Gier

Evers + de Gier was responsible for the UX and UI design of the app. Not just as an executor, but as a strategic design partner from the start. We began with research: interviews with healthcare workers across different sectors, from hospitals to home care organizations. What does their working day look like? How do communication flows work today? Where does the frustration sit?

From there, we developed prototypes, tested them with care providers, and refined them based on feedback. Functionality, brand experience, and ease of use came together in one product.

We also contributed to the positioning of BeterDichtbij toward professionals. A new segment, a new audience, a new way of communicating what the app does.

‍
Measurable impact in healthcare

The results are concrete. One hospital implemented a hybrid care pathway for skin damage follow-up, where digital check-ins replace most in-person consultations. Patients who previously came in three times now need just one physical visit. That translates to roughly 1,800 fewer consultations per year and 300 hours of saved consultation time.

In home care, the impact is equally clear. At Thuiszorg West-Brabant, fewer physical home visits are needed thanks to video calling through BeterDichtbij. Care workers support clients remotely, and clients gain more independence in the process.

The outcome: more efficient work, less phone pressure, and better job satisfaction for healthcare professionals. BeterDichtbij is now used by 60 healthcare organizations and 1.7 million patients across the Netherlands.

What the jury said

The jury described the winning entry as "clever and effective in its simplicity, with real potential for other hospitals." That scalability is exactly what BeterDichtbij is built for: an approach that works across healthcare contexts, from hospitals to mental health organizations and home care.

This award belongs to everyone who worked on this project. At BeterDichtbij, at Evers + de Gier, and at the healthcare organizations that had the courage to do things differently.