Your Medical Records, Anytime, Anywhere
Medix app is a platform that enables patients to carry their medical records on their devices, providing easy access and transfer of information during interactions with healthcare professionals.
Summary
Conceptual Electronic Medical Record Application
Project Overview
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Product : Medix Application
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Timeframe : 2 months
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My Role : UX Researcher and UX Designer
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Team : Medical Advisors, UX Designers
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Tools : Adobe XD, Pen and Paper
Tasked with reimagining the patient experience, I led the design of the Medix application, resulting in a user-friendly platform that empowers patients to manage their medical records independently.
Problem Statement
Patients often struggle to manage and share their medical records, leading to inefficiencies and a lack of autonomy in their healthcare journey.
Process
Research : Through interviews and observations, we identified key pain points, such as difficulty accessing medical history and a lack of communication between patients and healthcare providers.
Ideation and Design : We focused on designing an application that allows patients to store and transfer medical records, ensuring ease of access and communication with healthcare providers.
Prototyping and Testing : I designed interactive prototypes and conducted usability testing with a diverse group of patients, gathering feedback that informed iterative design improvements.
Outcome
The application empowered patients to manage their medical records independently, leading to increased patient satisfaction and engagement.
The process
The Storm
Picking up the pieces
At the outset of the project, we did not have a clear definition of hospital experience. Due to the lack of knowledge and insights, we partnered with patients and patient advisors to understand and learn what they were experiencing. Through interviews and observation of patients in their environment, I was able to come up with some ideas regarding what part of the hospital experience problem we could work on. Here are some pictures from the interviews.
The Calm
Most of the patients and patient advisors whom we interviewed expressed the lack of direction to life and dependency on another individual. All of the patients, carried a phone with them for assisting them in their day to day tasks. They knew how to use phones even though some of them were close to 60 years of age.
Putting Pieces Together
Defining the problem to tackle
At the outset of the project, we did not have a clear definition of hospital experience. Due to the lack of knowledge and insights, we partnered with medical advisors, patients and patient advisors to understand and learn what they were experiencing. Through interviews and observation of patients in their environment, we were able to come up with some ideas regarding what part of the hospital experience problem we could work on.
How might we ?
I started brain storming a few ideas by asking a few, "How might we" questions to solve the problem at hand.
1. HMW help patients carry their medical history with them at all times?
2. HMW help doctors know about patient family history?
3. HMW use a device to help patients store their prescription without misplacing them?
4. HMW make patients feel that they are sharing a story rather than reciting a list of drugs when they visit a doctor?
5. HMW create autonomy over medical data for patients?
6. HMW develop a system for communicating patient records without having to create a centralized system.
Defining the goal
Our goal was to provide them with an application that made them feel independent and empowered.
What sort of application ?
Our patients, Brenda, Helen and Victoria aged 46, 60 and 19 years respectively, adopted technology as a source of entertainment. They all used smartphones and regularly visited the hospital. These women wanted independence and voice their opinions.
Since all of them loved using their smartphones and enjoyed using it as a source of entertainment, we came up with the following mobile application ideas.
1. Creating a social media application to help form communities for inpatients and their families with other inpatients.
2. An application to help store and transfer medical records between patients and doctors.
3. A reminder application that acts like a virtual assistant.
Prototyping and Testing
While all the ideas were truly appreciated, the idea of creating an application to help store and transfer medical records received a large number of votes. Ideas 1 and 3 were existing as generic ones but idea 2 was more novel and unique. Therefore, I went ahead to prototype the idea, first using wireframes. Before prototyping, I created a storyboard to review the design idea with the user before completely accepting the idea.
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Mockup of iteration 2
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Final Design
Due to limited time, I could only create the patient interface for the project. As the project came to an end we created a journey map of the project. Initially, we started with ambiguity and zero design ideas. During the empathize stage of the design we were able to generate a lot of ideas. As we progressed, our design space reduced and so did our ambiguity.
Outcome and Reflection
The application empowered patients to manage their medical records independently, leading to increased patient satisfaction and engagement.
Reflecting on this journey, the most satisfying part was witnessing the genuine happiness of the users. Seeing their positive emotional reactions and their eagerness for us to continue the project was incredibly fulfilling. I had never felt so contented with my work before.
Throughout this process, I observed a significant transformation in my design thinking approach from when I first started the class. This experience underscored the importance of involving stakeholders and delving into the deeper needs of the users. It taught me that truly understanding and addressing user emotions is key to creating meaningful and impactful designs.