DESIGNED FOR PEOPLE WITH TYPE II DIABETES​
A CARING COMMUNITY APP
UNSWEETENED
ALL IN ONE.
HEALTH & WELLNESS · GROUP PROJECT · 3 - MONTH
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A platform for type 2 diabetes patients to connect, communicate and support each other, as well as a data base to record, share and learn about life habits. The workload was equality distributed between 3 designers and each person participated in all process.
BACKGROUND
1/3
Adults
More than 1/3 adults in the US have pre-diabetes; more than 80% of them don’t know they have it.
$327
Billion Medical Cost
$327 billion total medical costs and lost work and wages for people with diagnosed diabetes.
60%
Risks of Early Death
Risk of early death for adults with diabetes is 60% higher than for adults without diabetes.
1/4
Dollar
1 dollar out of 4 spent in health care is on diabetes.
PROBLEM
Our focus is on type 2 diabetes, encompassing its physical, medical, and emotional complexities. This condition demands significant lifestyle adjustments, posing a tough challenge for adults and amplifying their difficulties, as depicted in the image below
Before type 2 diabetes
After type 2 diabetes
PROBLEM STATEMENT
Diabetes patients are faced with huge lifestyle changes and are under stress, which are more likely to lead to emotional and mental issues. Conversely, it will affect their treatment attitudes and behaviors, making it a vicious cycle.
DESIGN SOLUTION​
EXPLORE
Forge meaningful connections with fellow diabetes patients while diving into a broad spectrum of content. Our community goes beyond just diabetes-related topics, embracing all aspects of life.
TWINS
Connect with someone who mirrors you. Whether the resemblance is physical or abstract, we match based on shared culture, dietary habits, interests, and more, allowing patients with commonalities to support each other.
MENTOR
Talk to different mentors and sechule session in a planned manner. Mentors all have unique experiences and perspectives, and they give diverse suggestions on a variety of topics.
DATA
Document and share information among diverse individuals, across various times, and through multiple activities. Compare both horizontally, by comparing with your twins, and vertically, by tracking your own progress over time.
SO, HOW DID WE GET THERE?
EXPERT INSIGHTS
Next, we conducted expert interview to learn more about diabetes and our interview questions can be divided into the following four topics:
TREATMENT
A difficulty in home treatment for diabetes is how you hold a person accountable, especially for under age and elderly patients.
COMPLICATIONS
Some attributes that signal diabetes: being thirsty, dry skin, fatigue, bmi weight, and infected feet, skin, or eye.
LIFESTYLE
Once diagnosed with diabetes, patients may experience a life change in diet, exercise, and medical treatments, which leads to emotional and mental stress.
DIAGNOSE
Because type 2 diabetes is difficult to self-diagnose, the estimated population with type 2 diabetes is much higher than actually diagnosed.
USER INTERVIEW​
From interviews with type II diabetes patients, we discovered four keywords that direct potential design opportunities.
POSITIVE
Set positive patients as role models for those patients who are less positive
PHASES
The situation of the first three months after being diagnosed is largely different what’s after
PEERS
In the middle age to elderly age group, most peers have a chronic disease
REWARDING
Switching to a healthier life style can be rewarding and self-achieving
INTERVIEW ANALYSIS
5 out of 6 interviewees mentioned that they had experience with online or offline diabetes patients group or community and felt being supported or helped.
The “why me” anxiety is often relieved when patients know more peers like them.
Even in a same patients group, some people control well but some aren’t self-disciplined.
LITERATURE REVIEW
It’s found that emotional health is prerequisite for physical health. When people stress about physical health, there comes a deficit in their emotional conditions (Garrett, 2014).
Reference:
1. Ducat L, Philipson LH, Anderson BJ. The Mental Health Comorbidities of Diabetes. JAMA. 2014;312(7):691–692. doi:10.1001/jama.2014.8040
2. Garrett, Chris, and Anne Doherty. "Diabetes and mental health." Clinical medicine 14.6 (2014): 669.
3. Robinson, David J., Meera Luthra, and Michael Vallis. "Diabetes and mental health." Canadian journal of diabetes 37 (2013): S87-S92.
4. McCarthy, G. M., E. R. R. Ramirez, B. J. Robinson, and Machinery Assoc Comp. Participatory Design to Address Stigma with Adolescents and Young Adults with Type 1 Diabetes. Translated by Assoc Comp Machinery Sigchi Assoc Comp Machinery. 12th ACM SIGCHI Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) Conference. Edinburgh, SCOTLAND, 2017. Originally published as Dis'17: Proceedings of the 2017 acm conference on designing interactive systems.
5. Gorin, Amy A., et al. "Binge eating and weight loss outcomes in overweight and obese individuals with type 2 diabetes: results from the Look AHEAD trial." Archives of general psychiatry 65.12 (2008): 1447-1455.
6. Hinneburg I. Psychosoziale Aspekte bei Diabetes mellitus [Psychological aspects of diabetes]. Med Monatsschr Pharm. 2014 Jun;37(6):222-4. German. Erratum in: Med Monatsschr Pharm. 2014 Aug;37(8):283. PMID: 25051812.
7. Somogyi A. SzerkesztÅ‘i kommentár. Cukorbetegség és elmebaj [Editor's commentary: Diabetes mellitus and mental disorders]. Orv Hetil. 2011 Mar 27;152(13):497. Hungarian. doi: 10.1556/OH.2011.29073. PMID: 21398209.
8. Dowd KR. Could hearing loss be the link between diabetes and depression? N C Med J. 2011 Sep-Oct;72(5):402-4. PMID: 22416526.
VALUE PROPOSITION
PROBLEM
Diabetes patients face lifestyle changes and stress, leading to emotional and mental issues. It will affect their treatment attitudes and behaviors, making it a vicious cycle.
OPPORTUNITY
How to help diabetes patients to break the vicious cycle and adapt to lifestyle change?
OBJECTIVE
To create a product that mitigates mental issues of diabetes patients in order to let them better focus on healthy lifestyle and diet, and better control their disease.
IDEATIONS
In the first round of ideations, we created sketches and storyboards for our brainstorming session, allowing our creativity to flourish without boundaries. Subsequently, we organized ideas into specific categories with an affinity map.
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In the second round, we transitioned to the digital platform to structure our ideas, aiming to identify concepts that encompass numerous features yet remain clear and understandable.
Hybrid
Interface
Service
Product
INITIAL CONCEPTS
1.
Social Sports Game
This design is for a dual-purpose wearable: a remote for exercise games and a glucose monitor that reports health stats, featuring glucose testing, gaming, health reporting, and social connectivity.
2.
Transition Support System
The design offers a holistic management tool for diabetes, integrating diet, social connections, exercise, and medication in one platform. It provides a wealth of resources for comprehensive diabetes care.
3.
Connective Community
A community-focused platform with an extensive diabetes information hub. Assists patients through creating discussions, encouraging peer support, providing health guidance and tracking health data.
CONCEPT SELECTION
We assessed our chosen design ideas against five standards: environmental sustainability, user interaction, aesthetic appeal, user-friendliness, and educational value. Concept 3: Connective Community excelled across these categories and was selected as the definitive design.
WHAT DEFINES THIS CONCEPT?
JOURNEY MAP
During several phases after being diagnosed, positive patients’ mentality influenced their decision making, and thus allows them to outperform pessimistic patients.
ECOSYSTEM
Our research reveals that while family and friends offer emotional support, they lack medical expertise. Conversely, doctors provide health guidance but not emotional support. Patient connections, however, strike a balance, offering both emotional solidarity and valuable shared knowledge.
Our concept develops a virtuous cycle ecosystem involving mentors, optimistic patients, and pessimistic patients. Mentors guide, while optimistic patients uplift the pessimistic ones, fostering a positive mindset. The goal is for all patients to gain enough experience to become mentors themselves, thus continuing the cycle with new patients.
CONCEPT
DATABASE
Build a database to record and learn.
MENTOR
Find a mentor to follow validated previous path.
TWINS
Find twins to inform each other’s lifestyle and medication strategy.
ONE SENTENCE DEFINITION​
A platform for patients to connect, communicate and support each other, as well as a data base to record, share and learn about life habits.
KEY FEATURES
USER FLOW
STORYBOARD
1. Diagnose type 2 diabetes. Feel depressed and can’t imagine the rest of life.
2. Discover our community and feel not alone.
3. Group chat about not only treatment, but also emotion and life.
4. Record data daily and check health report and suggestions to modify treatment strategy.
5. Meet ‘twins’ who share a similar background, learn from each other and contribute to treatment methods.
6. Decide to become a mentor to help more patients like themselves a year ago to get through the toughest time.
VISUAL GUIDELINE
LOW-FI PROTOTYPE
USABILITY TEST
We ran usability tests on our low-fidelity prototype with four participants to spot system issues. We tracked how long and how successfully they completed tasks, collecting their input afterward. Post-trial, we refined features like the entry point to mentor sessions, placement of the discovery tab, and home screen layout, enhancing navigation and overall user interaction. While these tests were designer-led, we'll test again with real users once the high-fidelity prototype is ready.
EARLY ITERATIONS
USER TEST & EXPERT REVIEW
Once our initial revisions were complete, we took our prototype into the field for real-world testing. We reconnected with our initial interviewees for user testing to determine the effectiveness of the design. Additionally, we sought evaluations from industry experts who provided valuable insights. The outcome was a general endorsement of the design's structure and usability by both users and experts, pointing out four specific areas for improvement:
MODIFY HOME SCREEN LAYOUT
REMOVE TWINS' TASKS
ADD MENTOR CENTER
MODIFY HOME SCREEN LAYOUT
Moved the feature of finding people to the "Connect" page, streamlining "Home" for content and posts, while "Connect" is dedicated to fostering personal connections.
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Relocated the "add post" button to the top left to prevent obstruction of content and minimize accidental taps, responding to user feedback about the previous floating button.
Move people finding feature to “Connect”
Relocate “add post” button
We also introduced different sized post cards for connections and non-connections to help users quickly identify content of interest. Larger cards are used for posts from connections to highlight potentially more relevant information.
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Addressing the needs of our primary demographic, which includes middle-aged and elderly individuals, we noted difficulties in reading longer text on posts. To improve readability, we've enlarged the font size and line spacing.
Different display card for connections’ posts
Increase font size and leading
REMOVE TWINS' TASKS
From the user testing, it became clear that mandatory tasks assigned to twins weren't received positively by users. They disliked being compelled to complete these tasks. As a response, we've chosen to eliminate these obligatory tasks. Instead, we've enhanced the matching algorithm to improve how users discover individuals that they genuinely wish to connect with.
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To foster connections without mandating task completion, we now offer streak icons to users who keep up their communication on their own initiative.
​Match with people that share similarities
Encourage spontaneous conversations
ADD MENTOR CENTER
Implemented a search bar and filter options to help users effectively find mentors tailored to their preferences.
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Introduced a "Mentor Center" section within the "Connect" tab to streamline the mentor matching process, simplifying the user journey by centralizing requests, eliminating the need to visit individual profiles for mentorship requests.
Add filter to perfectly match a mentor
Centralize the mentor matching feature
ENRICH DATA FEATURES
Introduced a feature where users can see how their daily glucose levels compare to the weekly average at specific times, providing direct insight into how meals and exercise impact their glucose trends.
Enabled users to compare their data with that of their "twins," fostering a positive motivation by observing similarities and differences with peers managing similar conditions.
Added the option for users to alert emergency contacts or other relevant stakeholders through notifications in case of sudden changes in their health trends.
Compare data vertically with a weekly average
Compare your data horizontally with twins
Use stakeholders as emergency contacts
In the earlier version, users could view data only at specific moments. We've now upgraded the system to include graphs for all health trends, enabling users to track how each data point evolves over time.
Individual graph for every health trend
FINAL DESIGN
NEXT STEPS
COMPLETE USER FLOW
Though we've tackled most major features, our user flow still lacks clarity in areas like the mentor application process and data documentation via devices. Our next step is to refine these details, making the user experience seamless and complete.
BUSINESS STRATEGIES
While user needs are central to our project, advancing it requires a viable business model that aligns with industry standards. We'll explore and integrate effective business strategies to elevate our project to the next level.
ACCESSIBILITY & INCLUSIVENESS
We acknowledge the significant presence of elderly users and those with complications leading to disabilities among diabetes patients. Hence, we're committed to broadening our design approach to encompass inclusive design principles, ensuring our solution caters to a diverse user base.
