Presentation
UberEats, Apple, and Swiping Right in the Future of Healthcare UX – How Consumer Digital Experiences are Forcing Change in Healthcare Interactions
SessionMobile Applications (DH1)
DescriptionPersonalization. Transparency. Anticipation. Convenience. When ordering a meal through UberEats, these might not be the terms you think of first. However, these values can make or break our experience as a consumer, and we are getting increasingly used to the expediency they bring to our interactions with other products and systems, not just when ordering food. Through patterns and personal anecdotes this talk will unfold how consumer expectations are spreading even into the complex healthcare space.
Personalization, the ability to create your optimal Friday night take out, add the anchovies, remove the mushrooms and have a gluten free base puts the customer in control of the outcome. Transparency, knowing who is going to deliver your order to your address and clarity of cost, establishes confidence and trust in a reliable outcome. Anticipation, minute tracking of your order’s route and timing translates to a predictable, seamless experience. Convenience, the ability to order a meal without leaving your chair and no need to worry about cash or card with automatic payments, makes for a satisfying conclusion.
In healthcare, these aspects often feel like luxuries. Even though the need for it is just as present, if not more. A luxury that patients, or rather care consumers, increasingly expect to be normal in their everyday experiences but incongruently are rare in healthcare is dissonant with user expectations of being able and responsible to make informed care decisions.
As practitioners in user research and human factors, we frequently encounter pre-determined paradigms that define end-users’, whether patients or clinicians, expectations of products, services and systems at three levels:
· The overall system, incorporating interactions between a network of care providers and platforms (how UberEats links to each restaurant in your vicinity).
· The interaction’s channel, whether digital or physical, at home, on the go, or at a care facility (how Apple provides support within its products, online, at central hubs and through local resellers).
· The feature level, such as a product’s controls and use cues that users are programmed to understand, consciously or subconsciously (how Tinder taught users to swipe right for something they like).
Even though improving health is a strong motivator for many, when consumer’s expectations are repeatedly underserved, frustration and discouragement result - even with the most engaged patients. Reduced quality of care and an increase in associated costs can be the results: from unattended (telehealth) appointments to unnecessarily alarmed patients and to a higher need for patient education and hand holding by care teams. Designing with consumer experience paradigms in mind can ensure familiarity, usability and higher satisfaction throughout the care journey.
In Veranex’ work in this space, we have also learned several watch-outs that need to be considered in design development. Specifically, virtual technologies and consumer-centricity can lead patients to start approaching their care delivery as more transactional, disassociated, anonymous experiences. For example, with more of clinical data and analytical tools potentially available at their own finger tips, less value may be placed in a physical check-in. The assumption that a 5-minute telehealth consultation can provide direct output based on selected input diminishes the holistic perspective that empathy and in-person conversation can foster, a factor of concern for clinicians. Such expectations might be beneficial for “simple” commercial transactions. However, when translating them to the healthcare field – unfiltered and failing to account for complexities, from interdependent comorbidities to privacy of highly personal data – this can lead to unrealistic or even problematic expectations. Besides, more informed patients tend to enter their – already overburdened – physician’s practice with more detailed questions. How will HCPs keep up? And what will the consequences be for patients that do not have access to the same information or experience?
This talk will touch on the fine balance between designing with and for consumer experiences in healthcare interactions, the challenges and opportunities. Patterns emerging from user research conducted by Veranex will be illustrated with anecdotes and for each of the three levels. Examples will show how we at Veranex have applied techniques to uncover these paradigms and design solutions to meet current and future consumer expectations for personalization, transparency, anticipation, and convenience.
Personalization, the ability to create your optimal Friday night take out, add the anchovies, remove the mushrooms and have a gluten free base puts the customer in control of the outcome. Transparency, knowing who is going to deliver your order to your address and clarity of cost, establishes confidence and trust in a reliable outcome. Anticipation, minute tracking of your order’s route and timing translates to a predictable, seamless experience. Convenience, the ability to order a meal without leaving your chair and no need to worry about cash or card with automatic payments, makes for a satisfying conclusion.
In healthcare, these aspects often feel like luxuries. Even though the need for it is just as present, if not more. A luxury that patients, or rather care consumers, increasingly expect to be normal in their everyday experiences but incongruently are rare in healthcare is dissonant with user expectations of being able and responsible to make informed care decisions.
As practitioners in user research and human factors, we frequently encounter pre-determined paradigms that define end-users’, whether patients or clinicians, expectations of products, services and systems at three levels:
· The overall system, incorporating interactions between a network of care providers and platforms (how UberEats links to each restaurant in your vicinity).
· The interaction’s channel, whether digital or physical, at home, on the go, or at a care facility (how Apple provides support within its products, online, at central hubs and through local resellers).
· The feature level, such as a product’s controls and use cues that users are programmed to understand, consciously or subconsciously (how Tinder taught users to swipe right for something they like).
Even though improving health is a strong motivator for many, when consumer’s expectations are repeatedly underserved, frustration and discouragement result - even with the most engaged patients. Reduced quality of care and an increase in associated costs can be the results: from unattended (telehealth) appointments to unnecessarily alarmed patients and to a higher need for patient education and hand holding by care teams. Designing with consumer experience paradigms in mind can ensure familiarity, usability and higher satisfaction throughout the care journey.
In Veranex’ work in this space, we have also learned several watch-outs that need to be considered in design development. Specifically, virtual technologies and consumer-centricity can lead patients to start approaching their care delivery as more transactional, disassociated, anonymous experiences. For example, with more of clinical data and analytical tools potentially available at their own finger tips, less value may be placed in a physical check-in. The assumption that a 5-minute telehealth consultation can provide direct output based on selected input diminishes the holistic perspective that empathy and in-person conversation can foster, a factor of concern for clinicians. Such expectations might be beneficial for “simple” commercial transactions. However, when translating them to the healthcare field – unfiltered and failing to account for complexities, from interdependent comorbidities to privacy of highly personal data – this can lead to unrealistic or even problematic expectations. Besides, more informed patients tend to enter their – already overburdened – physician’s practice with more detailed questions. How will HCPs keep up? And what will the consequences be for patients that do not have access to the same information or experience?
This talk will touch on the fine balance between designing with and for consumer experiences in healthcare interactions, the challenges and opportunities. Patterns emerging from user research conducted by Veranex will be illustrated with anecdotes and for each of the three levels. Examples will show how we at Veranex have applied techniques to uncover these paradigms and design solutions to meet current and future consumer expectations for personalization, transparency, anticipation, and convenience.
Event Type
Oral Presentations
Track Keynote
TimeMonday, March 2510:30am - 11:00am CDT
LocationSalon A-2
Digital Health