Thrive Online Patient Portal
Mari Shear, UX Designer
Duration: 10 weeks
Tools Used: Sketch, Figma, Miro, Google forms, Adobe Illustrator and Zoom
Role: Responsible for all roles during this case study
Design Methods
+ Research
Project Overview
Online patient portals are becoming a more heavily used resource for patients. This project began to help understand how chemotherapy patients are interacting with their current patient portal system and how they may be helping and also falling short of meeting patient’s expectations.
Problem Statement: Chemotherapy patients are in need of a better online patient portal system to manage their demanding schedule and as an aid to help understand their complex diagnosis.
Design Process Overview
Define
Research
Plan
Design
Prototype
Testing
User
Feedback
Iteration
Research
Research was conducted via a google forms survey which gathered data from 12 participants and 5, 1-to-1 interviews with various and current online patient portal users who were currently in chemotherapy treatment.
Secondary Research was conducted
searching for any evidence that could
support my hypothesis as well as a heuristic analysis of current patient portals in operation..
Google forms surveys, with questions to learn more, were sent out to user groups for feedback.
One to One Interviews with 5 participants were conducted to learn more about the relationships chemotherapy patients have with their online patient portals.
I set out with a screener survey which aimed at answering the questions that were required to gain more understanding..
What are the main challenges associated with current patient portal technologies?
What are the current features of online patient portal technologies that chemotherapy patients value the most?
What parts of the online patient portal do you find easiest to understand?
What parts do you find more difficult to understand?
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Much of the feedback I received noted that scheduling and canceling appointments through the app was difficult. I also noted the complaint that navigation and search features to quickly jump to selected dates and times of appointments were lacking in most patient portals, forcing the user to use a back or forward button to navigate test results by date.
Surprisingly the lack of transportation assistance to get to and from appointments was also a topic of conversation as many of the responders were of older age and may have suffered the loss of a spouse or had children that could not be of help because of distance or life circumstances.
1-to-1 Interview Participants
Plan: putting my new insights to use
After I interviewed each volunteer I took all pertinent quotes and information and formed my affinity map. I then combined all of my research and created an empathy map to help to understand the experience of a typical all around user. I included current pains, things a user hopes to gain with their portal, what a user typically sees in relation to their portal, thinks and feels about their portal, says, does and hears in relation to their online patient portal.
Affinity Mapping
Empathy Map
After affinity mapping and empathy mapping to gain a better understanding of an all around user, I developed two main personas.
First and Secondary Personas
Insights
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How might we make online patient portal navigation features easier to use?
How might we make online test results easier to understand?
How might we make messaging features between doctors and patients more user friendly?
How might we make online ride scheduling available and easier to plan?
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Design
As I worked through the initial wireframe sketch design, quotes from interviewees helped shape the flow. “I wish was a way the patient portal could display more features on the front page, when you first login” “Im not really familiar with ALL of the features on my patient portals, I just know what I need” This quote made me think of what the most pertinent features should be available at first glance, at the very start of the app. “The bloodwork results aren’t written out for you in plain english, so it is hard to understand what they are saying without having to look it up on the web.”
Home page needed to have the most important elements to help save time and give the more pertinent information right up front.
Search Feature needed to be visible at all times to be able to pull up important information from dates/times of certain appointments
UBER Feature a possible solution to the lack of transportation that was described by some of my interviewees?
Navigation Features had to be clear and easy to find, in the form of a navigation bar on the bottom.
Test Results had to be expandable and easy to understand with more detail on offer.
First Wireframe Designs
After searching through my initial interview notes, one of the participants mentioned that she wanted to "Thrive" for many years to come. So then became my app name, "Thrive." I wanted Thrive to represent many of the things that current chemotherapy patient portal users were getting. Empowering through understanding their health, trustworthy by proving quality explanations during an uncertain time. I also wanted that added friendliness, that makes sterile medical topics more digestible and approachable.
I then created a logo that tried to embody what Thrive meant to me. In all the things that make us feel at our very best, let understanding our health be one part of that entire picture. The flower, emphasized by the one petal in main brand color, really seemed to fit that.
Prototype
I built my prototype using a Figma. I then made new screens containing a new feature suggested to me in the second round of guerilla testing in the form of a "My Notes" feature to help patients remember questions that may come up when browsing their test results and improved navigation in the form of back buttons at the top of the page .
On my final iterations I focused giving an easy to understand navigation bar. Colorful and easy to spot test result values that were out of standard range and should be paid attention to. I also added a clickable medical jargon feature similar to the style of wikipedia, which would highlight words that may be confusing and upon click, would open to a definition.
My intention is for the app to have a medically approved glossary that would discourage looking outside the app for alternative meanings and instill a level of trustworthiness through approved definitions by medical doctors. I also kept the "Uber" ride feature on the home page as a support system for patients who may not have family members to give them rides to and from appointments.
Conclusion
With the uptick in the need for doctors and the limited amounts of time care teams have to spend with individual patients today a need for a better patient portal technology is sorely needed. We have to give people the confidence, that they once had in doctors, back and provide the tools for patients to understand what is happening to their bodies . Patients need to feel empowered and confident about the choices they make with their medical care and feel like the doctors who help them are invested and available. That starts with an easy to use, functional, friendly and empowering online patient portal.
