Docmeup

Overview: Healthcare platform that connects patients and doctors. It aims at facilitating and assisting the user through the intricate process of booking a medical appointment.

Role: UX Researcher, UX/UI designer

Toolkit: Sketch, Adobe CC, InVision, Miro, Pencil and paper

Overview

• Background

The geographical area of interest is Italy. Here, the national health system is an intricate maze and suffers from lack of information and limited accessibility. The usual process for a patient to find a doctor is to make a first appointment with a general practitioner to enquire about professional clinics and services. More often, the quickest solution is to “ask around” and get an idea of where to go and what to do. 

• Research Goals

We would like to discover and overcome the most challenging aspects of booking a professional visit and, as a result, to understand what next steps to take in order to create a smart system where both patients and doctors can swiftly operate.

• Methodologies

  1. Secondary research

  2. User interviews

Secondary Research

What do I already know?

There aren’t many websites to manage healthcare online and, to book a professional visit.*

*I’ve run this research among Italian websites, since the chosen area is Italy.

What do I not know?

I don’t know how many people use these sites nor how people feel about them.*

*I’ve run this research among Italian websites, since the chosen area is Italy.

What does success look like?

• Incrementing the amount of users using online platforms.

• Creating a platform where users can complete the entire professional visit booking process.

User Interviews

• Overview

I’ve interviewed 6 people: patients without kids (25-35 y/o), patients with kids (35-45 y/o) and doctors. All interviews have been conducted remotely by using google meet.

• Affinity Mapping:

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Research Findings

Family and friends

All the participants recognise the power of reviews.

The need of saving time

Saving time is a shared need among all participants

Overused of whatsapp

This is evidence that patients need credible platforms

Treating an emergency

Educating patients to discern urgent from ordinary issues.

Persona #1

Tamarcus Brown

Accounting manager - 35y/o - Career oriented

Bio

Even though he gives great value to his own healthcare, he doesn’t dedicate enough time to it. He’s often not consistent through a therapy and sometimes he decides to postpone medical visits, mostly due to his busy schedule. 

When facing an already-known health issue, such as a cold or a sore throat, he simply proceeds with tablets or medications he’s used to. When facing an unknown and potentially more critical issue, he usually asks his mum and dad, because it’s the fastest and safest way to get a sensible answer. When he rarely has time though, he likes to investigate a bit further by comparing different opinions.

Goals

• To access a large comparison of opinions, when looking for a new professional doctor
• To achieve more efficiency when dealing with a health matter. 
• To be able to quickly book a medical appointment

Frustrations

• He often has a feeling the doctor he ends up with is not the very best he could find after a deeper research. 
• Medical visits tend to overrun and overlap
• He doesn’t have time to waste phoning a clinic over and over again in order to book/get an appointment.

Persona #2

Social media manager - 40y/o - Family oriented

Artem Beliaikin

Bio

She’s in maternity leave and will go back to work in a few months. She’s worried whether she will be able to take care of her children’s needs the same way she does now.

She makes large use of the Internet when looking for information. Specifically, she uses technology to deal with preventive care and advice for her kids’ health. However, when facing a serious health issue she doesn’t search it online. In that case, she prefers to ask people she knows and trusts, such as family and friends or sometimes the general practitioner.

Goals

• To have access to a reliable source of information, especially when dealing with kids health issues.
• To manage health issues in a more relaxed way.

Frustrations

• She doesn’t know if she can trust online platforms when it’s about healthcare. 
• When facing a serious health issue, she gets impatient and anxious because of the uncertainty of the situation.
• She hates queuing at the doctors’ clinics. She doesn’t like to attend crowded places for hours, especially after COVID.

Prioritisation

• Project Goals

With the end of research phase, it was time to narrow down the essential needs for my product and to make a plan for eventual features to build up. Firstly, I had to get a clear view of business and user goals. The common ground between them has been summoned up into three points:

- Time reduction when managing healthcare issues

- Flexible platform where patients can experience online consultation as well as in-person visits

- To convince more users to return as well as to share positive feedback about the online platform

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• Product Roadmap

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Information Architecture

Building my sitemap was a pivotal step to understand how to articulate my platform. One thing was clear at this stage: “book appointment” will have been the main focus of the platform.

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User Flows

I’ve created user flows for the entire website. It was crucial to turn all my work into pages, buttons, inputs and links. After creating user flows, I’ve decided to develop in depth two task flows that I’ve eventually tested with my prototype: Book an appointment and Leave a review.

Task Flows

#1 Book an appointment. The flow includes the search of a specific doctor through filters; the choice of doctor and time slot and finally the checkout.

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#2 Leave a review. The flow includes the search of ‘personal appointments’ area within personal account; the finding of ‘Previous appointment’ section and finally leave a review and submit it.

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Wireframes

I’ve started by creating key-screens. Homepage; Hamburger menu with primary navigation; Book appointment landing page; Full doctor profile and MyCaledar view where users can check for past/previous appointments.

Low-fidelity wireframes have helped me identify in more detail each step/screen and action. Here, I’ve also started to reflect on the hierarchy of all the elements that compose the entire page .

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During mid-fidelity phase I had the chance to improve and refine each screen and to start foreseeing how the platform could eventually look. This step also gave me the opportunity to set up layouts and grids for optimising some screens for desktop viewport. 

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Brand Identity

For the creation of the logo, I’ve used the following process. DOCMEUP is a system made of 3 elements: patient/doctor/platform. I’ve used the figure of a ladybug as a start. It’s symbol of protection, healing, good fortune, and grace. From there, I’ve created an abstract mark with 3 geometrical shapes.

UI Components

Here, I’ve defined the elements that will compose my high-fidelity wireframes. Starting from colour palette and typography, I’ve then created buttons, cards, modals template and built my segt of icons.

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High-fidelity key-screens

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Prototype

First of all, I had to set up Artboards dimensions in order to create a scrolling prototype. 

I started generating interactions by connecting different artboards in order to re-create the experience of the website, such as clicking a button. Additional steps after that: defining my homepage as the start point; set up fixed elements, such as the navbar.

I’ve synced my sketch file with my Invision workspace. The use of Invision helped me improve the simulation, by adding the iPhone mockup and refining the transitions among screens. 

Outcome

I’ve tested my two tasks on 5 people. Age range of the participants: 27-40 y/o. All the tests have been conducted remotely by using Google meet. This gave me the opportunity to study how people interact with my product

I’ve analysed results from user tests and sorted usability feedback into a 2x2 diagram. From there, I’ve identified patterns and consequently decided on what changes to make. 

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Iterations

Thanks to usability tests, I’ve identified four major iterations to my original project:

  • I’ve added date and time under Filters for users who want to set availability at the very beginning of the booking flow;

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  • The shortcut to the homepage was not straightforward for all the users. I’ve left it always at the centre of Navbar and moved the navigation path right under it

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  • The vertical layout I had built for availability was confusing for some participants. I’ve tried horizontal view for choosing the exact time of the visit;

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  • In order to leave a review, some participants got confused by the existence of My appointments and MyCaledar. As a consequence, I’ve merged the two pages into one, where users can find past and previous appointments.

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• Lesson learned

The power of testing and iterating. Users have been proven to be the main source of inspiration throughout the project. Firstly during research phase, when I was trying to define the problem to solve. Secondly in usability test, when they pointed out faulty steps and helped me identify further issues, in some cases even suggesting solutions.

Mark Twain: “Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection”

• Challenges

One thing has been clear form the start: this research had a great potential and it could have been expanded through many interesting additional features to the final product. The biggest challenges was to identify the essential ones and then to build them up without leaving anything to chance.

Other major challenge was surely to leave aside what I thought could be the best solution as a designer. I attempted, on the contrary, to listen to what users really needed and wished.