Medical Alert Device Website
Bentley User Experience Center, Fall 2018
This was a three-phase project that took place over approximately four months at the User Experience Center. My team was involved in phases two and three. The project focused on the users and the website of a national medical alert device company.
- Phase 1: Usability test of existing site, and persona development and validation
- Phase 2: Participatory design session with representative users
- Phase 3: Wireframe design, usability test, and iteration
Phase 1
Phase 1 was carried out by a separate internal team. The results of their usability test informed the decisions we made about the initial version of the wireframes, and their validated personas helped craft our recruit for both the participatory design session and the wireframe usability tests.
Phase 2
Our team looked at the issues and sentiments identified in Phase One and crafted a participatory design session meant to target emotions, needs, and desires surrounding the idea of being cared for or giving care to someone. Then, participants worked together to sketch out a rough journey map detailing their experience of researching, purchasing, and using a medical alert device.
Phase 3
Our team looked at the issues and sentiments identified in Phase One and crafted a participatory design session meant to target emotions, needs, and desires surrounding the idea of being cared for or giving care to someone. Then, participants worked together to sketch out a rough journey map detailing their experience of researching, purchasing, and using a medical alert device.
We took the feedback from the usability test of the website and the insights gleaned from the participatory design sessions, and used them to craft wireframes that were meant to improve the overall experience for both caregiver and care recipient user types.
Usability Test – High Level Challenges & Solutions
| Challenge | Solution |
|---|---|
| Key elements of the site include terminology that is confusing or misleading for users | Use clearer information architecture and basic terminology to guide users through the research process |
| Users have limited or no understanding of how many or what varieties of product are available | Use visual and structural cues to help the user differentiate between systems and products from the outset |
| Users have difficulty differentiating between product types, their optional add-ons, and their associated costs | Use clearer information architecture and basic terminology to guide users through the research process |
| There is a need for comparison between products and between competitors that is not fulfilled on the site | Create simple, clear comparison elements on both mobile and desktop |
Participatory Design – High Level Challenges & Solutions
| Challenge | Solution |
|---|---|
| Caregivers want to feel sympathized with, while care recipients want to feel energized and empowered | Create content specifically for each high-level user group, and be conscious of each set of needs on common sections of the site |
| In seeking care, participants are naturally skeptical and hesitant to trust a third party | Be fully transparent in all aspects of the site, and seek to help the user rather than push to make a purchase |
| The research process has no set length, but all participants would like it to be shorter and simpler | Help the user make a decision, and make sure they understand why that decision is the right one for them or their loved one |
| There is a tenuous relationship with the notion of “caregiver” and “care recipient” | Don’t force the user to identify with these terms, and where possible create an egalitarian relationship between the two |
Trust & Transparency
This theme was clearly paramount, especially for caregivers in an emotionally volatile state. In addition to encouraging the creation of simplified and streamlined copy from the client, our team created modules that helped the user clearly understand what the options are, how they work, and what they cost.
The need for this kind of transparency at every stage was reinforced through our usability testing of the wires.
Clarity & Guidance
Our strongest recommendation for this theme was to alter the copy and terminology on the website to avoid obscure branded nomenclature and recognize industry terms that users might not understand.
In terms of design, we recommended bringing users through the research process using a more narrative process, one that guides and explains without feeling condescending. The participatory design session helped shape this narrative, pushing us to infuse every step of the process with empathy and clarity.
Differentiation
While the broad concept of medical alert devices was familiar to most participants, the component pieces were largely foreign. Participants did not know what the devices might look like, what pieces they contained, and how they physically functioned.
The revised design helped clarify this by removing photography of the products and replacing it with representative iconography, until the user arrives on a product detail page. The usability test showed the team that product imagery before this point was confusing and did not help the process of deciding upon an appropriate device.
Conclusion
- The participatory design sessions gave us valuable quantitative insight about the sentiments that surround the process of researching and purchasing a medical alert device
- The usability tests of the wireframes allowed us to understand how our interpretations of those sentiments did or did not work, and we were able to work from that information to build wireframes that effectively help users make the journey from research to purchase
