AsthmaSense

Background

AsthmaSense is a system designed to cater to the day-to-day challenges asthma patients face with their diagnosis. The system includes a wearable component for asthma-related therapy tracking, an application that allows users to track the usage status of their prescription medication, create reminders to ensure they follow their regimen, place orders for medication that the application indicates is running low, and monitor the data indexed from the wearable wrist watch. The goal is to alleviate stress surrounding their regimen routine and reduce feelings of negativity surrounding the use of an inhaler, which can stem from social stigmas.

Client

Class Project - Design for Behavior and Experience in Healthcare

Team

Tara Farzin
Yi Ting Chen
Xinyi Zhang

Date

Feb 2024 -
Mar 2024

Tools

Figma
FigJam
Adobe Photoshop

PROCESS

Project Overview

The Challenge

We were tasked to research an assigned diagnosis to find the primary pain points commonly faced by patients within that condition, and create a design for therapy adherence as well as providing solutions for these pain points.

The Solution

A 3 part system including a wearable wristband which tracks key asthma-related metrics, and notifies the wearer with alerts for potential symptoms like an asthma attack. A mobile application that visualizes the collected data, sends alerts for possible asthma attacks, and facilitates medication management, including ordering refills directly through the app. Additionally, the app assists users in adhering to their treatment plans by providing timely reminders for medication intake .

My Role as UX/UI Designer

In this project, my tasks included conducting scholarly research into the assigned health disorder, conducting a user interview, creating both proto-personas, and sketching low-fidelity concepts of the early stage designs of our prototype. I administered all 7 user tests for our project's "Placing an Order" interaction. I was also in charge of assembling the presentation, crocheting our wristband wearable component, as well as the final wireframes and final prototype.

Brainstorming

EXECUTION OF IDEATION

Who

The system was designed to target parents of children diagnosed with childhood asthma, as well as asthma patients who are of age to manage the system and own their own devices to access the app independently.

What

A multifaceted system comprised of three main components: A wearable element to track asthma patients' health and behaviors, an application for data visualization and threshold alerts of the data provided by the wearable, and a medication management, reminder, and ordering system.

Why

The scope of the project assigned was to create a design for treatment adherence because there is an existing challenge for individuals diagnosed with asthma trying to maintain their medication regimen. There currently are no systems in place tailored to assist asthma patients specifically with their diagnosis.

How

While creating components of the system, we used Figma where I designed and wireframed our prototype, and Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop for creating and imposing icons and images used in the prototype. I also crocheted a low-fidelity version of what the wearable wristband component would look like when designed for a target user group diagnosed with childhood asthma.

Research

Our research process consisted of a thorough investigation into user behaviors and preferences through primarily scholarly research. By delving into a respository of scholarly articles, we were able to deduce some of the main pain points and areas of discomfort that asthma patients often feel frustrated with. Additionally, our research indicated that the majority of asthma patients were children who were diagnosed with early childhood asthma, adults who grew up and retained their childhood asthma symptoms, or individuals with extraneous diagnoses such as psychosomatic asthma.

Some of the adherence challenges our research indicated that were a struggle for asthma patients included their dosing frequencies, complex regimens, forgetfulness or complacency toward their diagnoses, and misunderstandings or lack of instructions when given their medication regimen.

Further research conducted included performing a series of interviews with friends and family of ours who are diagnosed with asthma. Our interviews found a variety of responses. One interviewee shared that as a child diagnosed with childhood asthma, growing up it was common for them to be closely monitored and micromanaged by their mother who ensured they were staying on top of their diagnosed medication regimen. They explained that this could be stressful for their parents at times, as often they were unaware of the specific instructions associated with each drug, as well as potential side effects, and were unsure of how effective these medications may truly be. This interviewee expressed that having a reminder system as well as an information source to ease her family's concerns would have been ideal for them growing up with their diagnosis.

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Research Findings

Interview Findings

Persona and User Scenario

To gain deeper insights into our users' goals, needs, experiences, and behaviors, I developed two personas with scenarios to represent the target user group. These personas were crafted based on insights gathered from both user interviews and scholarly research, keeping the main pain points and areas of expressed discomfort in mind when imagining their daily lives and routines. I framed both personas around individuals who best represented our target user group for the overall system, which decidedly became a parent of a child diagnosed with childhood asthma and an adult diagnosed with psychosomatic asthma. Whenever I needed to gain perspective and reassess my initial ideas during the design process, I referred to these personas which allowed me to better understand the needs of my users.

Low-Fidelity Prototyping

In the early stages of imagining our design solutions, we created two different low-fidelity sketches of the application part of our system, considering look and feel as well as substance, as well as a sketch idea of the wearable data collector as we imagined it for our younger target user group. Separating the different components of work among the three of us allowed for a wide range of creative input, enabling us to individually assess each team member's ideas.

Eventually, we collectively decided on the most preferred design elements from each sketch to incorporate into our medium-fidelity prototype, and weighed the significance and relevance of certain elements and functionalities before deciding whether they should remain in future iterations.

Medium-Fidelity Prototyping, Testing, & Iteration

This stage of the process involved developing a medium fidelity and an interaction to test with users. A general concept of the home page, prescription description page, and health metric index page were created. User feedback allowed me to narrow down and focus on the interactions I wanted to flesh out for the final prototype. Feedback included eliminating certain technological features within the wristband that either don't exist yet, or would be too difficult to conceptualize within the time scope of the project. Users also suggested that we focus on and determine the primary functions of the application, as well as a better idea of what the home bar might look like.

The interaction I tested with 7 users was not with the medium fidelity prototype. Instead, I developed the final prototype right after the completion of the medium-fidelity wireframes. This allowed for a more accurate representation of the design aesthetic and provided a clearer path for how we wanted users to be able to navigate the application. User testing feedback for the "Place an Order" interaction included changing certain font colors to more clearly indicate important information, and to label the graph axes on my index page, as the purpose of the numbers in the charts were unclear.

Final Design and Reflection

AsthmaSense aims to provide asthma patients and their caregivers with solutions to better detect their Asthma symptoms, keep track of medication stocks, provide reminder notes, and keep records of prescriptions to increase patients’ adherence to treatment.

The process of researching, designing, and executing AsthmaSense taught me a lot about myself as a group collaborator, a leader, and a designer. The work I created for this project pushed me in terms of my creativity, work ethic, and planning skills. Scholarly research and user interviews allowed me to gain a technical and personal level of understanding of asthma and the struggles and symptoms associated with it. Creating proto-personas and user testing allowed me to put myself in the shoes of my user groups better and as a result allowed me better insight when going into creating the interactions and final designs. Creating our final clickable prototype tested my skills as well as my trust in myself and my design process. Completing this meaningful assignment pushed me out of my comfort zone but allowed me to explore and learn about a field that I am interested in.

If we had more time, I would have loved to have the opportunity to create a higher fidelity prototype of the wristband wearable data tracker which incorporates Arduino boards and LED lights to simulate vibrations in the event of a potential emergency situation for the wearer. LED lights would correspond to a color coding feature for each medication within the application.