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Project Overview
Build a mobile app from scratch to help digitalize the suicide intervention procedure.
The app is available in app store and currently under clinical trial.
Client
UMass Medical School
Role
UX Designer,
Researcher
Final Deliverable
50+ final Screens, Design Library, Logo, Interactive Prototype, Supporting Document, User Research Report
Background
For patients who are sent to ER for suicide attempts, one very important part of their intervention process is to get help and resources to cope with crisis after hospital discharge.
However, the current paper-based forms and brochures has it's barriers to use, such as lack of portability, traceability and accessibility. And thus, the client - UMass Medical School and UMass Hospital would like to build an mobile app to make resources more accessible for suicidal patients after discharge.
Problem
As the team is pretty clear with what features this app needs to have, the main focus on the design’s side is
How can we make sure suicidal patients can use this app? Especially while they are in crisis?
Process
To me, the challenge is that I didn't really have much knowledge about this user group, and it certainly required more research to fill in my knowledge gap to help me better empathize with our users.
A huge benefit that we shared from the nature of this project, was that our stakeholders have very rich domain knowledge, and we also had access to resources including doctors, consultants, and patients.
Graph - Project Timeline
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With caregiver interviews and research, I was able to lay out the initial design concepts. In early design stage(lo-fi to mid-fi), we also have co-design sessions with providers and patient interviews to get reviews and feedback to validate my assumptions.
Image - Patient Interview Data (Blurred in protection of sensitive data)
Insights
We got a lot of inspiring and interesting information from all those different types of researches, but here are 3 major insights that guided my design decisions throughout the process.
Many of our target user suffer from different levels of cognitive declines.
Insight 01
When in crisis, users need to get help /resources/distractions right away, without clicking into screens after screens.
Insight 02
Insight 03
Although our users share some similar frustrations and goals, they are very diverse in cultural background, and has variations in digital literacy.
Deliverables & Outcome
Alpha version is well received by the patients with an average of 8/10 based on first round of user testing.
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Clients are very satisfied with the overall deliverable and appreciated the thorough design and rationale documentation.
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Documentation
Style Guide + Component Library
