Overview
NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital was looking to modernize its healthcare journey by introducing a “Digital Front Door” application. The idea was driven by creating a mobile app that would improve the experience of a hospital stay (subjective) and thereby raising HCAHPS scores.
We pitched a concept that the mobile experience would merge medicine, motivation, and mind which would not only guide patients and families, it would also include content that would change habits and lead to better overall healthcare outcomes.
The Client
NewYork-Presbyterian is one of the nation’s most comprehensive, integrated academic health care delivery systems, dedicated to providing the highest quality, most compassionate care and service to patients in the New York metropolitan area, nationally, and throughout the globe.
NewYork-Presbyterian is consistently recognized as a leader in medical education, groundbreaking research, and innovative, patient-centered clinical care.
Goal
The provider wanted a delightful, organized mobile experience for patients and families planning a hospital visit with access to information, communications and additional functionality and content.
Integrated content that facilitated a heightened level of patient empowerment which translates to improving habits.
Patients who are more in control of their health = better health outcomes.
Outcome
A worldclass app that offered access to customized and personalized information related to before, during and after a hospital stay. The experience included specific references to raising healthcare outcomes as per hospital HCAHPS scores.
The flagship app was designed and launched for NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and soon after to the nine other campus hospitals in the New York metropolitan area.
My Contribution
As an experience designer and UX designer, I worked with my design team to design every screen (50+ screens). I designed and produced many of the screens personally including photo selection.
My input led to the creation of a new internal process for duplicating apps and content saving the company many engineering and design hours. The team successfully duplicated the app nine more times in a fraction of the time.
My Role
Experience designer, art director, project manager, content creator and producer, SCRUM master
Experience designer, art director, project manager, content creator and producer, SCRUM master
Skills
Research, attention to detail, stakeholder management, project management, visual design
Research, attention to detail, stakeholder management, project management, visual design
Methodology
Agile, Human Centered Design
Agile, Human Centered Design
Process
Ethnographic research, In-depth interviews, visual design
Ethnographic research, In-depth interviews, visual design
Deliverables
Journey mapping, storyboard, rapid prototyping, light blueprinting
Journey mapping, storyboard, rapid prototyping, light blueprinting
Tools
Figma, Sketch, Photoshop, Principle
Figma, Sketch, Photoshop, Principle
Year
2016-2017
2016-2017
Research, Personas and Journey Map
Ethnographic research was conducted at multiple hospitals around the United States including the client’s hospitals based in New York City.
Interviews were conducted with actual patients regarding their previous hospital stays. Learnings translated into personas and later a light journey map.
Workshops were held with key stakeholders throughout the process where feedback was collected and incorporated.
Prototype
The initial prototype was built using Principle. At first, we used rapid prototyping to communicate the general flow of the app to our client. Within a short time, we began updating the screens with actual content. Design and production ran weekly sprints and a new prototype was launched every Friday. Later, when Engineering caught up to the design, prototyping was replaced with TestFlight app(s).
Challenges/Key Learnings
Overall the project was successful as the app was launched in the app store and featured content for 10 hospitals with over 800 screens of content. The app included customized content based on the patient's surgery. For example, a patient checking in for a birth experienced a different journey/content vs a heart surgery. Managing all of this content was challenging and required exceptional attention to detail, problem solving and organization. This was a major challenge and learning experience for our team.
As a nimble start-up, we operated with expediency, employing rapid prototyping, and adhering to a "fail fast" approach as the bedrock of our creative process. Collaborating with a very large company with many layers of decision making was challenging. My team adjusted to the constraints of their branding guidelines and specifications despite the limitations.
