Improving the digital management of long-term health conditions
University / Individual Project / 8 months
Omni
/ˈɒm.nɪ/
Prefix: all in all ways, etc., without limits
Making universal healthcare universally accessible. Omni is a web app that gives patients with long-term health conditions more ownership and control over their care. The app connects patients, making healthcare a communal experience, and gives them more access to specialists' knowledge and skills.
My role
As an individual Master's thesis project, I was responsible for everything, from research to design. This gave insights into each stage of the design process, from start to finish.
A brief was developed using the UN's Sustainability Goals as a basis, before creating a research proposal for the project. The first phase of the project encompassed all research activities; exploring the subject area, identifying existing problems, and extracting insights to lead design exploration.
The second phase of the project built upon the knowledge and insights gained; this was where we could get creative to solve the problems we found earlier. Here, I ran ideation sessions, co-design sessions, and online user testing to develop the final solution.
Project progress was documented with digital logbooks, and summarised with illustrative reports and presentations.
Responsibilities
Discovery, research, ideation, prototyping, user testing, visual design & UX design.
Timeline & output
8 months to research, design, and prototype a healthcare app, culminating in an output that included reports, development logbooks, presentations, and an interactive prototype.
Team
This was an individual project from start to finish, although assistance was provided by my personal tutor and Design School support staff.
High-level goals
01 / Make car accessible for everyone
Specialist conditions require specialist doctors, who often aren't accessible for rural patients. Remote healthcare currently doesn't meet rural patients' requirements and needs to be innovated to meet ever-changing demands.
02 / Give patients more agency
Giving patients more knowledge, skills, and capabilities is key to enabling people to make the right health and care choices, as reported by the National Information Board in 2020. Increased agency could benefit both patient and health service.
03 / Drive digital innovation
Desire for improved digitisation of healthcare is high among patients, but currently the demand isn't being met. Innovating in this area could revolutionise how care is given, and vastly increase the possibilities and improvements available.
Research
Research was split into three phases, each designed to build on the knowledge gained in the previous phase. Each one was planned around a different research activity, aiming to uncover different data points through different methodology, which together would produce actionable insights to take through to the design phase.
Phase 01 / Initial discovery
Research was kicked off with a literature review to gather knowledge, before utilising a screening survey and focus group for further discovery. Affinity maps were used to review the findings before drilling down more to inform later research.
Phase 02 / User empathy
In an effort to gain an insight into the experience of attending a consultation with an endocrinologist, a role-playing exercise was conducted with three participants. Both current-day and 'ideal' scenarios were explored to see the comparison.
Phase 03 / Defining the problem
To build upon the knowledge gained from previous phases of research, interviews were conducted with endocrine patients and experts to create a more detailed picture of the problems faced by the key stakeholders.
Personas
A set of variables of attitudes and behaviours from the interviews was produced, which meant each participant could be mapped out and compared.
Two patient personas were produced; the ‘high-knowledge’ patient, who’s highly engaged and directive of their care, and the ‘low-knowledge’ patient, who’s unmotivated and disengaged.
Actionable insights
01 / Limited communication
Patients can’t access better care as health centres
and doctors are isolated from each other, limiting opportunities for communication, second opinions, and specialist care for those who live rurally.
02 / Inaccessible knowledge
There is a limited knowledge base for specialist conditions, but even this limited information is inaccessible for patients, who rely on specialist information to look after themselves and their condition.
03 / Inefficient care
Patients become disengaged from positively impacting their care because inefficiency, bureaucracy, and wasted time make their efforts ineffective, leading to frustration and abjection towards their care.
04 / Inefficient technology
Technology is already an intrinsic part of healthcare, but it’s poorly implemented, which limits its ability to assist with and improve care and prevents patients from fully engaging with their care.
Opportunities
Design opportunities were identified based on the insights generated from the research conducted previously. The centred on expanding digital care and communication and giving patients more opportunity and ownership over their care.
UX Vision Statement going into the design phase
There’s an opportunity for a product/service for patients with a long-term endocrine condition who want to engage with their healthcare more, but are prevented from doing so through limited communication, isolated health centres, and a lack of specialist knowledge.
Concept generation
Innovative methods were used to generate creative solutions. These methods encouraged group ideation, improved creativity, and problem-solving, and allowed for user feedback during idea development.
Design development
After generating a number of different ideas, the project moved into developing the concept in detail. User feedback was gathered early and often while the screen layouts and interfaces were designed. Concept reviews, co-design sessions, and lo-fi prototype testing provided ongoing feedback and refinement.
Prototyping was done in three phases, with each step increasing the quality of the prototype. The final result was a complete design proposal that included branding, visual design, and a functional prototype.
Virtual concept reviews looked at the proposed direction of the project using basic user flows to convey the key touchpoints. This helped not only identify areas for improvement, but also highlighted certain details regarding existing healthcare solutions that could be applied to improve the concept.
A co-design session with patients was held to improve the concept, create UX principles, and plan the prototypes. The session developed the UX principles of the app using the "MosCow" method to determine the most important principles (with "mistake-proof" design being the top priority). Features were prioritised and categorised to help create the site map and identify the unique selling points of the concept.
Early prototypes were lo-fi but interactable, allowing for quick turnarounds while still giving users a more realistic view of the app. First, creating basic flows for important journeys through the app, and reviewing basic layout ideas with users. Secondly, building on previous feedback with more detailed journeys through key features that make the app unique.
Mid-fidelity prototyping was the final stage of testing before moving into branding and graphic design work to tie the experience together.
Branding profile for Omni; key elements and information showing the focus on inclusivity and accessibility for different sightedness.
Meet Omni.
Universal healthcare made universally accessible. Omni allows patients to engage with their healthcare more than ever before, by connecting them with their doctor and other patients to make care a communal experience.
Built to be accessible and responsive. Omni is designed to be accessible for all, no matter the device. By designing it to be a web app, Omni can be implemented natively on any operating system on any device.
Social Spaces. One of the unique features of the app; these spaces are areas for patients to connect with others in similar situations, allowing them to give and receive support. Misinformation is combated by allowing patients to react only with pre-set reactions and comments.
Live Forums. Regular remote presentations and discussions led by medical professionals. Patients can watch along, comment, and ask questions, all giving them the knowledge they need to aid their own care.
Integration with the NHS. For patients, NHS integration means they use their existing NHS information to log in so they can access the data that’s already stored about them. For doctors, it means moving their communication and patient management into one central system.
