Medilog is a health-supporting app for remote elderly families.
We want to improve the experience of updating health status among remote family members.
This project has won the UX by student category of 2019 Vancouver UX Awards.
time
August 2018
duration
6 weeks
type
school project: app design
team
Estela Xu / Nikie Zuo / Nusrath Imtiaz / Keefe Liew
tools
Adobe XD / Adobe Illustrator / After Effects / ProtoPie / Adobe InDesign
strategy
persona / user journey map / wireframing / prototyping / user testing
role
visual lead / UI co-director / Illustrator / UX designer
01. Problem
02. User Research
03. Opportunity & Challenge
04. Introducing Medilog
05. Impacts
Due to employment, education, or emotional attachment to a place, family members often tend to live apart. Older adults living alone often hesitate to share health-related information and problems with their loved ones. They believe sharing constant updates on their health to be burdensome to their relatives or think their issues are too trivial to bring up in normal conversation. However, remote caregivers need assurance that their loved ones are safe and doing okay.
With Medilog, we facilitate communication between both parties by making this transfer of health-related information more seamless and engaging by offering a thorough overview of the care-receiver’s health while providing suggestions to improve it.
“Sixty-five percent of older adults with long-term care needs rely exclusively on family and friends to provide assistance.”
— Institute on Aging
While Medilog can also be used to self-track and improve one’s own health, we decided to target our research and solution towards two specific audiences.
Remote relative who wishes to stay up-to-date with their elderly relative's health status while helping them take better care of themselves.
Remote senior whose health is being taken care of by one or more caregivers.
We narrowed our focus into key problems that care-receivers and caregivers have and came up with the four points below which needed to be addressed by our solution.
1.Communication of medical condition is dependent on the care-receiver’s perception of their own health.
2.Care-receivers only share when prompted during phone calls.
3.Care-receivers often forget or neglect to care for themselves unless reminded or motivated.
4.In case of an emergency, the caregiver is not aware of the care-receiver’s condition and location.
We looked into wearable technology because it allows the elderly to measure their health status effortlessly. We identified four opportunities from connecting the elderly with their distant caregivers with wearable devices:
1.Allow easy data tracking of the elderly and instant notification of the caregivers’ message
2.Measure health data and geo fencing at anytime through a personal accessory
3.Provide adequate data for organizing reports, which can be read by caregivers and medical professionals
4.Give immediate alert when detecting potential emergency situation
Distant senior care has been a social issue as the result of civilization, while the younger generations are moving away from their hometowns. Trying to solve this problem, our ideas were more ambitious at the brainstorming stage, such as linking the app with the hospital system and giving specific medical analysis. After interviewing some medical professionals, I acknowledged some critical challenges that we could be facing if we defined the app in the medical category. The challenges are ranging from different perspectives:
1.Limited data types and accuracy of the measurements on wearable devices
2.Following medical and health related ethics and codes
3.Diagnosis depends on various perspectives other than a few health data
For the sake of the accuracy of medical diagnosis, I suggested to focus the intended audience on the distant elderly and their young caregivers instead of medical professionals. One significant decision we have made is to keep the app family-friendly with general lifestyle suggestions rather than specific medical treatments.
Our solution is Medilog, an interconnected and intuitive app which would inform the caregiver of the care-receiver’s health status while providing support, care, and protection to the care-receiver at all times through helpful suggestions, daily reminders, and emergency alerts.
1. Suggest, don’t dignosis
We offer care suggestions that range from anything like taking a yoga class to walking around the neighbourhood everyday to help the care-receivers lead a healthier lifestyle. We never wanted to offer a diagnosis through Medilog, but only make our users aware of the care-receiver’s health status. At most, Medilog would suggest the care-receiver visit their family doctor to get a proper and professional diagnosis in case of alarming data.
2. Explain, don’t tell
Data alone doesn’t communicate much. Graphs on their own don’t explain the state of a person’s health. We needed to explain what the collected data meant in a way that won’t overwhelm or confuse the user in a simplified yet informative manner.
“Data by itself is not valuable. What data means is more
— Manager of User Experience at SAP
3. Positive and understanding tone
The nature of the information we were communicating might be sensitive and personal. We never wanted to appear clinical and impersonal when offering suggestions and providing reports. Since this app is meant to be used between family members and loved ones with the intention to care for one another, we wanted to maintain a friendly, positive, and understanding tone with empathy at its root.
4. Easy to use
All elements of the app, both on the smartphone and especially the smartwatch, had to be easy to use. This included having a large font size on the smartwatch interface to make it easy for the care-receiver to read their reminders and suggestions. Since we did not want to burden the care-receiver, we also had to create a way for the caregiver to set up the care-receiver’s account and health-related information.
The onboarding uses a cartoonish and narrative illustration to highlight key information about the application, including how to setup and get started, and its main features.
One feedback that we gained from the primary user testing was the complexity of the app functions, including how to pair up devices and data collecting methods. To help tell the introductory story in the onboarding, I incorporated the app interface in the scenario-based illustrations. The onboarding experience drew the audience’s interest and was appreciated by the participants in the secondary user testing.
Take a closer look on the onboarding illustrations…
Our Home page contains real-time data such as heart rate, exercise and activity, and sleep patterns collected from the care-receiver. From our user testing, we found that graphs and data itself weren’t important to caregivers. They wanted to understand what the data meant. This is why we offer a quick analysis of the real-time data when the cards are tapped on.
Users can select which data they wish to keep or remove under settings. Upcoming and past tasks and appointments are also shown below. Using personable greetings and offering friendly suggestions transforms Medilog to feel almost like an additional family member.
Weekly and monthly reports are generated using the amalgam of data in order to keep the caregiver informed, aid them in spotting potential health problems accurately and easily, and allow them to take actionable steps to improve the care-receiver’s health via related suggestions.
Initial user tests informed us that people did not want to read a lengthy and clinical report on what health data meant. They wanted a quick overview of the most important facts along with whether this data was good or bad. Pairing suggestions with the related sections was also useful in understanding what actions would cause what changes.
Medilog's Schedule feature lets you create three types of reminders for your care receiver.
01. Care Suggestion
Reports offer care suggestions derived from the collected data which can be added to the schedule.
02. Care Task
Necessary actions a care receiver must complete, such as taking their pills on time.
03. Medical Appointment
By searching for nearby clinics or connecting with their family doctor, caregiver's can set up routine check-ups.
This helps the care-receiver in maintaining or improving their health while feeling cared for and gives the caregiver a sense of relief and connectedness by making them involved in their loved one’s life.
Care-receivers can view their own real-time data, upcoming daily tasks, completed tasks, and tasks for tomorrow in the main screen of their Apple Watch. When it is time for them to complete a task, they receive a reminder that can be snoozed or marked as complete. Care suggestions are voluntary and only completed if the care-receiver wishes, but provide the caregiver with an opportunity to be involved in the care-receiver’s life.
In case an emergency occurs, many websites on distant caregiving suggest you create a plan with your family on what to do, who to contact, and how to alert each other. Keeping this in mind, we created the emergency alert feature for the care-receiver to trigger when they are in need of help.
Caregiver chooses what classifies as an emergency under account settings and is notified when this range is crossed or if the care-receiver manually initiates an emergency. We understand that in stressful situations, people need to know the core details of the situation and how to proceed, so we present them with the cause of alarm, along with a quick analysis of what this means, the real-time location of their care-receiver, and links to call their care-receiver or 911 if needed.
Tapping on the red bell icon triggers the emergency alert. The care-receiver chooses whether to contact just John or both John and the paramedics. This alert can be auto-triggered by the system or manually triggered by the care-receiver because we understand there can be certain emergency situations which are not health-related or trackable by the Apple Watch, such as falling down a flight of stairs.
Medilog is able to provide information, motivation, and relief to both the caregiver and care-receiver, taking remote healthcare to the next level. No longer is distance a barrier between caring for a loved one and being aware of their health status. Using recent advancements in health-based technology, such as Apple’s Health app and Apple Watch allows us to stay ahead and stay aware. We utilize the accuracy and convenience of technology to help foster care. Self-care is promoted and made easier through Medilog and the caregiver’s support. We’re creating a way of living which offers care-receivers the comfort of their home along with the comfort of knowing they are healthy, safe, and cared for by their loved ones.
Our team in the 2019 Vancouver UX Award gala:
