UX Design Portfolio - Kimberly Gassner

User-centered Assistance and Safety System

Category: Tablet App • Time: 6 Months • 2020

Within this interdisciplinary project, a user-centered Assistance and Safety System for supporting caretakers and patients with dementia is developed. The system uses intelligent behavioral analysis methods for predicting the patients’ health status and potential risks.

Results

Summary of research results, insights into the work of professional caretakers and a first version of the app-prototype

Problem Statement & Goals

Develop technological support for professional caretakers specialised in caring for clients with dementia by using tablets with a specialised app. Most importantly, the project included determining which technological support would really help them in order to avoid additional workload.

The goal of this project was finding a solution to help the caretakers by simplifying their care records, which they currently have to complete on a smartphone app and additionally as handwritten documentation. Additionally, the system shall show predictions about the patients’ health status and potential risks.

Users

Professional caretakers specialised in caring for clients with dementia

Role in Project

Research and Prototyping in a team of three M.Sc. Human Factors students in the project semester

Working in a group, the tasks for everyone were distributed evenly. I led parts of the focus group, participated in the ideation sessions for concept creation and created the wireframes in Axure RP. Additionally I lead multiple expert review sessions and took part in the analysis of the data.

Design Process

Literature research

Literature research was carried out about the following subjects: UIs for caretakers, technological support for retirement homes and hospitals, symptoms of dementia

Focus Group
As a second step, a Focus Group at a retirement home was carried out in order to better understand the needs of the professional caretakers.

The focus group included:

Creating personas
Creation of a daily calendar to provide an overview of the caretakers‘ tasks
Brainstorming: Identifying essential support functions required for an in-home care interface

Literature research

Creating personas
Creation of a daily calendar to provide an overview of the caretakers‘ tasks
Brainstorming: Identifying essential support functions required for an in-home care interface

Literature research

Creating personas
Creation of a daily calendar to provide an overview of the caretakers‘ tasks
Brainstorming: Identifying essential support functions required for an in-home care interface

Paperprototyping & Wireframing
Considering the results of the Focus Group, the key functionalities were defined. A prototype was created using the methods paper prototyping and wireframing (Axure RP). Since the UI is specific to the use on a tablet, special attention was given to the element size.

Expert Review
An online Expert Review with usability experts was carried out in order to gain further insights for the implementation of the app. (Due to the pandemic, a usability test with the caregivers was not possible).

Feedback of the expert review included:

Seperate menu items related to the patient and the caretaker to make the navigation more intuitive
Display critical alerts and warnings in a dedicated section on top of the home screen (heart rate anomalies, emergency signals, or important notes from the care protocol)
Include biofeedback data on the home screen to give caregivers an immediate overview of the patient’s current condition
Present the information gathered by the camera system in a more visual format

Feedback of the expert review included:

Seperate menu items related to the patient and the caretaker to make the navigation more intuitive
Display critical alerts and warnings in a dedicated section on top of the home screen (heart rate anomalies, emergency signals, or important notes from the care protocol)
Include biofeedback data on the home screen to give caregivers an immediate overview of the patient’s current condition
Present the information gathered by the camera system in a more visual format

Feedback of the expert review included:

Seperate menu items related to the patient and the caretaker to make the navigation more intuitive
Display critical alerts and warnings in a dedicated section on top of the home screen (heart rate anomalies, emergency signals, or important notes from the care protocol)
Include biofeedback data on the home screen to give caregivers an immediate overview of the patient’s current condition
Present the information gathered by the camera system in a more visual format

UI Design
Although UI design wasn’t originally part of the project scope, I decided to use the expert feedback for creating an improved concept and UI design after the project was completed. This allowed me to deepen my concept and visual design skills.

Conclusion

Con
clusion

Important steps for simplifying the documentation records of caretakers working with patients with dementia were taken. For this complex project it is very important to test the app with the caretakers again and further iterate on the documentation functionalities, to ensure the use of the app fits into their everyday workflow.

Location

Copenhagen, Denmark

Munich, Germany

Contact

LinkedIn Profile