ROLE
User Researcher
October 1st, 2021 - July 7th, 2022
I served as the primary User Researcher for this capstone project at Barcelona Technology School. Amongst a team of 5 for the development process of "Hygiea", my duties throughout this project were to conduct generative research on the Diabetes market in Spain, competitive analyses of the current market for Diabetes management devices, as well as usability testing for mid-high-fidelity prototypes.
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THE CHALLENGE
Hygieia is laser-focused on solving a problem that has in large part come about because of a severe lack of focus on creating sustainable and healthy habits for our children to adopt. The practice of eating balanced meals, exercising regularly, and sleeping soundly have massive positive impacts on our lives.
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My team of five has carefully evaluated the current market for Diabetes management devices to identify a shortage in digital applications, in addition to gamification that tackles both preventative and current measures to tackle Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes for young children specifically.
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Below is a competitive of applications designed for children, utilizing caretaking and gamification methods. Few applications address all three features (Blood Sugar Tracking, Diet Tracking, and Child focused). Hence, the beginning of Hygiea's journey in its development process.
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DISCOVERY
PHASE
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- Secondary Research
- Stakeholder Analyses
- Primary Research
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The development of Hygiea has adopted the Double Diamond process model to conduct market discovery to address the following research Questions:
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How do parents currently assess their child's health management through external devices in the diabetes space?
What do consumers look for in a diabetes management application?
Do children value an application that values health and gamification?
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SECONDARY RESEARCH
In order to understand Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes as a whole, it is imperative to assess the market size and need for diabetes management devices/software. My teammates, Maho Kakimoto and Adam Koehler, and I,  have compiled our findings in the following slides.
PRIMARY RESEARCH
- Pollfish: Online Survey
- Scale: 100 Participants
- Location: Spain
- Participants: M/F, 20-50 years old
Through survey findings, Hygiea hoped to seek user information on...
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1. Who is the market that will utilize digitalized diabetes products?
2. What devices are in the Diabetes market?
3. What are the general frustrations that users have with diabetes devices/digital applications?
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KEY QUALITATIVE SURVEY FEEDBACK
Approximately,
30% of all survey participants​ expressed daily blood glucose alerts/monitoring as a useful function in a Diabetes management application in an open-ended question, What features of your diabetes management application do you find to be the most useful?
Additionally, user's frequently provided the following insights:
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"I don't use any, but the most useful thing I suppose would be to see your blood sugar levels at any given moment.
"Sometimes I forget to enter data, perhaps a reminder would be helpful".
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KEY QUANTITATIVE SURVEY FEEDBACK
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Approximately,
72% of survey participants currently utilize an automatic blood glucose meter to track their daily levels.
57% of participants exercise 2-3 times a week
48% of participants consult with a dietician every few months
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DEFINITION PHASE
As a result of both Primary and Secondary findings, My team and I, "Hygiea" began its initial development to keep the following features in mind for testing in each stage of prototype development
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Blood Glucose Tracking
Meal Tracking
Behavioral modifying gamification
Exercise Tracking
Gamification
DEVELOP
During the developmental phase of "Hygiea", my team and I carefully assessed potential prototype solutions to be incorporated in the concept validation phase.
After we had defined features for the application, the focus shifted toward the three features based on ideation sessions and concept validation with parents and Healthcare providers. Thus, furthering the target audience of Hygiea to parents and their children who any experience diabetes themselves, or has had one or more family member with the condition.
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In addition, the concept represents children will receive a personalized device with a fictionalized character that will remind them to look at alerts pertaining to the three main features below.
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Blood Sugar Monitoring
Sleep Tracking
Excercise
PROTOTYPE ITERATIONS
Our UX Designer, Adam Kohler, and Branding Strategist, Giulia Stucchi, provided mockups for three iteration stages.
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During the third (high-fidelity) dual application mockup that...
Incorporates a personalized handheld device that tracks exercise, meals, and sleep through a fictional character that alerts the child user of changes in his/her body to make/made throughout the day.
A mobile parent-controlled application that syncs exercise, meals, and sleeps from the handheld device, to a dashboard to review at the end of each day.
PROTOTYPE
TESTING
- Zoom
- 1:1 Think-Aloud Assessment
- 1 Interviewer + 1 notetaker
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Target Audience: Parents + Young children
Age: Any (Parents) + 6-13 (Children)
Recruitment Method: Whatsapp groups + personal mobile contacts
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Through each session of testing with the prototype, users were prompted to test the following functions in order:
​Child's handheld device
Review prototype to summarize understanding of the character's feedback regarding meals eaten that day
Follow consistent "think aloud" testing for exercise and sleep tracking functions
Read meters that pertain to meals eaten, exercise, and sleep.
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Parent application
Review BGM, Sleep, and Exercise levels on the dashboard ​
Set exercise and sleep settings
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RESULTS
- Miro: Affinity Diagramming
- Metrics:
Divide User feedback based on each task (Child Device and Meal/Sleep/Exercise Functions
Assess where users typically require a tutorial to complete the task
Children Device
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Participants did not intuitively know that the device tracks exercise
Time on task for meal tracking was too slow
Engagement is lacking due to a lack of rewards/feedback on "undesired" (ex. Eating against recommended diet) behavior
Parent application
Parents expected to see a weekly and monthly view
Finding specific meals in the charts was not intuitive
Parents wanted to know the location of the diabetic child
Parents were expecting to see smart suggestions
Iconography for features on the graph is unclear to users
DELIVERY
Build out geolocation services to track the child's device
leverage data to provide realtime notifications when child's blood sugar is too low/too high/the child skips meals
Build weekly/monthly/yearly views in parent application
Improve gamification in child device
Add rewards system in child's device to increase engagement
Allow diabetic users to input insulin levels from external sources (injection etc.)
REFLECTIONS
As a result of user feedback, Hygiea's future development will consider gamification/habit-building features that will encourage the child user on the device to develop long-term habits, in addition to finding an appeal in the functionality of the application.
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During the usability testing phase, Children users typically placed value on character design, with customizable in-app features. After each level of overall health progression (exercise, sleep, and meals eaten), a new item of choice will be rewarded to the account holder.
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Below is the promotional video for Hygiea, commissioned by a local animator.
Graphics designed by: Paridhi Vayda (Myself)
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