How many times have you gone to get your labs done, and then you never hear anything back? Are you curious about what is going on with your health? As part of my BrainStation Bootcamp, I worked on a health project to help patients and doctors identifying blood elements out of range.

Patients First is a government-led program to enhance patient care. The program seeks to put patients and people at the forefront of healthcare by better understanding their needs and perspectives and enhancing patient outcomes. This project helped me to have a better understanding of the importance of qualitative and quantitative research.

Timeline: 3 weeks.

Role: UX Researcher | UX Designer

Platform: iOS

Project type: Academic

Tools: Figma, InVision

Imagery & Icons: Undraw, Flaticon, DrawKit

View grayscale prototype

AN OVERVIEW

Minimizing risks of preventable deaths

Even though the numbers have been decreasing over the last years, Ontario still has many premature deaths from preventable and treatable causes. Premature death is considered when someone younger than 75 years old passes away. Ideally, if diseases were treated and diagnosed on time, Canadians could increase their life expectancy by five more years.

Preventable deaths are all those that might have been minimized by interventions, initiatives or campaigns like vaccines, lifestyle improvements or safety procedures. Deaths from preventable causes are those that could have been avoided with adequate clinical diagnosis and treatment.

METHODOLOGY

Double Diamond Design Process

For this project, I used the Double Diamond Design Process.I was able to narrow the problem space and solution from something broad using this process. There were also several pivotal occasions where I was able to rethink the solution in order to better assist users.

STEP 1 Research & Discovery

RESEARCH GOALS:

Understand how young patients keep track of their health.
Discover if they are aware of the importance of preventive healthcare and what is the best way for them to take action.
Validate assumptions as well as identify pain points, behaviours and motivations.

STARTING POINT

What is causing premature deaths?

Males had higher rates of avoidable mortality than females in general. Cancers (such as breast cancer) were the biggest cause of mortality in females, while circulatory diseases were the leading cause of death in males from treatable conditions.

Source: Statistics Canada, 2017

People residing in the least affluent communities had almost double the rate of preventable mortality as those living in the most affluent neighbourhoods. When the sex difference was factored, disparities were even more pronounced: males living in the least affluent areas had a rate four times higher than females living in the most affluent areas.

Risk of avoidable deaths

From preventable causes

%

Higher for men than women

From treatable causes

%

Higher for men than women

About 1 in 4 deaths of Canadians younger than 75 are from preventable or treatable causes

What I thought was my Problem space

How might we raise awareness of the value of routine check-ups among young patients in order to avoid early mortality?

FIRST DRAFT

Assumptions & Hypothesis

I made a list of assumptions before starting my qualitative research. I kept in mind who I thought would be my end users when I wrote these assumptions. I was able to target my interviewers by narrowing these assumptions.

I believe young patients don’t know the importance of regularly do check-ups.
Patients would like to know the results of their lab tests to change/keep their lifestyle.
Patients don’t do regular check-ups as the process to book an appointment is too complicated.
I believe patients prefer to Google symptoms instead of visiting their doctor.
Men are less aware of the possible diseases that might lead to death.
If patients visit doctors more frequently, diseases would be detected on time, preventing premature deaths.

I wrote my hypothesis using my list of assumptions. Having a hypothesis aided me in developing a questionnaire that I could later use to confirm or refute my hypothesis depending on my data.

I believe that if doctors communicate to young patients their lab results, patients could better understand their current health status and make adequate changes in their lifestyle to avoid serious diseases.

I will know this is true when interviewees agree to that statement and they advise they haven’t done any check-ups in the last year.

PRIMARY RESEARCH

Talking with patients

Based on my previous research, I realized that men are at more risk than women, so I decided to interview three men and two women to understand if women are more aware of their health.

3 men 25-40 years old
Living in Toronto/GTA area
Haven’t done a check-up in the last year
Not aware of current health status

2 women 25-40 years old
Living in Toronto/GTA area
Haven’t done a check-up in the last year
Not aware of current health status

I performed five one-on-one online interviews with young people to learn about their pain points, motivations, and behaviours. I used virtual sticky notes to collect quotes from interviewees, which I organized into three topics.

Pivot moment, the real Problem space

How might we help young patients connect to their doctors to receive better information and diagnosis in order to prevent premature deaths?

STEP 2 Synthesis

Oliver Garcia’s persona is based on the insights I gained from the interviews and research conducted during Phase 1. Oliver represented my primary users and served as my guidance in developing the best possible product for them.

Once I understood what patients go through, I wrote the following user stories. Based on the data collected from my interviews, I chose “As a patient, I want to see previous results so that I can compare my health history” to be my user story. I believed that if patients can see their test results, they will better spot any concerns with their health, resulting in fewer premature deaths.

The next step was to create a task flow diagram. Because patients rarely see their lab results, I thought of a way for them to compare them. As a result, I thought that users could enter a timeframe to compare their outcomes to earlier ones.

STEP 3 Ideation

INSPIRATION

What is out there? How to improve it?

Sketches aren’t the only way to come up with ideas. I sought inspiration from various places to develop something useful that would aid in the solution of the core challenge. I looked at what was already there. What’s functioning right now? What’s not? Why isn’t it functioning properly?

View Inspiration Board

For this prototype, I created three different variations of each screen. After deciding which elements I thought would work best for this product, I sketched some ideas. I used the ideation board that I had previously developed to produce these sketches. To create a digital version, I merged and highlighted different features of each sketch.

STEP 4 Prototype

FIRST MODEL

From paper to digital version

I created a home page with a dashboard that allows users to access local laboratories, health records, lab results, prescriptions, and health articles for this first digital version.

I created screens to present lab results and compare them to past results as part of my task flow. Individual reports, reviewed reports, and out-of-range items can all be accessed by users.

Following that, the findings can be compared to previous months, years, or the average range. This section was changed based on my task flow. Users can choose whether to compare by general time periods rather than individual dates. I opted to change this step because users may not always recall the exact date of their lab tests.

TESTING TIME

Is this what users need?

I went through two rounds of testing. Each one had five users. After examining which tasks users could and couldn’t do, I created a prioritization matrix to help me decide which modifications to make and how valuable they will be. The following are some of my findings from the first round of testing:

Overall, users were able to complete the tasks.
The majority of users expressed a desire for larger icons in the navbar.
Users felt the app was not connected with the verbiage used.
The app was inconsistent since certain buttons had larger font sizes.
The “compare by the average” portion was difficult to understand for 4 out of 5 users.

5/5

After making key changes in the prototype, I tested this second version with five different users on March 25, 2021. Here are my findings:

Users were able to complete almost all task successfully
The main pain-point of “compare by desire range” persisted
Users would prefer a different layout for the details page
Users could not understand the error message’s difference if they selected “cancel” or “yes.”
Users would like to move between tested elements within the chart instead of going back to the details page

After implementing feedback, we developed our third prototype. The overall changes from version 1 to version 3 were:

View grayscale prototype

COMING Next steps & key takeaways

OUTCOME

What I expect to be the final product

I’ll explore the brand’s visual identity as part of the next steps. I’ll check for the best fonts, colours, and images to use in the app and convert the grayscale prototype into a high-resolution prototype.

Once the hi-fi prototype is complete, I’ll conduct two rounds of testing to ensure that I’m on the right path while developing this product, much as I did with the grayscale prototype.

If the product succeeds in reaching the market, I hope to see a 5% reduction in premature deaths.

TAKEAWAYS

Research from the beginning

This project taught me the value of conducting research from the start. Why? As a result, the product will be user-friendly, and any potential faults will be addressed from the start.

Along the way, I learned how design and research work. You can’t have one without the other. While I thought I had the last and best product many times, testing and listening to consumers taught me that there are always more ways to improve things.

← Architectural Conservancy Ontario ACO