Ethos
Designing a dashboard to help monitor and change patients' drinking habits.
ROLE
Product Designer
TIMELINE
Feb 2024 - May 2024
TOOLS
Figma
Google Suite
SKILLS
User research
Wireframes
Prototyping
The Problem
Alcohol ranks third in preventable deaths in the U.S, yet only 7.6% of people with alcohol use disorder (AUD) are being treated.
How Ethos works
Ethos applies *SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention, Referral to Treatment). After the initial screening, Ethos does Brief Intervention on patients who tested positive.
*SBIRT is the current system for treating patients that struggle with alcohol misuse or AUD.
Brief Intervention uses evidence based techniques to treat alcoholism, such as:
Personalized feedback
Normative feedback
Motivational interviewing
Why this app matters
Ethos relies on remote patient monitoring (RPM), which is essentially telehealth. Through RPM, providers are able to help patients outside the hospital, expanding treatment.
With a breathalyzer, the provider is able to track the patient's BAC (blood alcohol concentration) and provide appropriate treatment strategies. The more the patient uses the breathalyzer to log their BAC, the more data the doctor can use to provide better treatment.
How might we encourage patients to complete their daily BAC reading?
Project Goals
Change behavior
Motivate patients to complete their BAC reading
Connect to doctors
Ensure patients frequently check in with their physician
Visualize progress
Use relevant data to promote positive change
Designing for behavioral change
The goal was to change patient behavior so that they completed their BAC reading at least 16 times per month (business goal). I began with researching how other healthcare companies successfully encouraged patients to change their behavior. Through this analysis, I found that many relied on quantitative data to trigger emotions. How this data was displayed varied.
APPLE HEALTH
Comprehensible information - Apple's health app leverages modular design to make data digestible so that individuals easily understand their current health conditions.
LESS
Awareness through gamification - This alcohol tracking app uses streaks to help users track and be aware of their drinking habits.
Iterating different solutions
I made several changes to the initial wireframe design based on user feedback. Receiving design critiques through collaboration with the other designer also helped me improve on my designs.
Change #1
Utilize color theory. The prominent purple I used in various locations drew attention to too many sections at once.
Not enough information. There wasn't enough useful data for the patient to draw conclusions about their health & progress.
Lack of visuals. Adding visuals (progress bars, graphs) helps users better understand the numbers.
A deeper look
Version 1
Hard to visualize the data because very wordy, all text
Almost all same font weight and size = harder to read, no emphasis on any item
Version 2
Color used sparingly for contrast instead of background
Suitable text sizing, color, and weight for various segments
Change #2
Too much data. More is not better. The amount of data was overwhelming for the user, especially for a home page.
No call to action. There wasn't a clear push towards behavioral change or what they should do with all the data.
Change #3
The feedback from the initial iterations guided me on how to improve both the user interface and user experience of the home page. I was able to design a home page that encouraged users to complete their BAC reading and remain informed about their treatment progress.
With all we knew, the final step was prioritization: what was so important for the user that it had to be on the home page, and in what order? What sections could be removed?
Nudge the user. The main goal was to have users complete their BAC reading, so the call to action was listed at the top.
Secondary information. We also wanted to inform the user of any upcoming appointments, reducing no-shows and improving rapport with the doctor.
Selective data. We chose relevant data for the patient, such as their BAC levels and alcohol consumption levels. The extra data from Iteration 2 was moved to a different page called "Insights," a more in-depth page for users to learn more about their health. *Users can get to this page by clicking "Show more insights" at the bottom.
Learnings
Learn design principles.
As someone who comes from a healthcare background, I had to learn design principles on my own to be able to design effectively for users. The foundations are relied on and repetitively used for a reason.
Research and ask for help.
Although I had minimal knowledge of alcoholism and its treatment, my curiosity drove me to heavily research the problem space so that I could design a better product for the user. I supplemented this with asking the founder additional questions, and her support really helped with my understanding of the problem space.