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Physician Portal

A mobile version of EMR system for physicians (2018)

Overview
Role
Skills

The Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system allows the clinical staff to record pertinent clinical operation information, maintain health records and provide a medium for staff and patients to communicate. The physician portal will provide a mobile version of EMR so that doctors can access the medical data anytime and anywhere. Doctors will soon be able to reduce the amount of time spent writing up clinical reports due to the application’s dictation feature.

  Project Owner

  UX Designer

  Project Management

  Communication

  Design Thinking

  Wireframe

  Prototype

Challenge

The parameters of this project were short and vague.

Create something for doctors, maybe a mobile version of EMR.

 

I was tasked with taking a broad, conceptual idea and turn it into something tangible. I took the lead on this project knowing that I would not be allocated much in funding or resources because I am passionate about product design and development. The most challenging part of development was maintaining a balance between what our budget would allow for and the end-user satisfaction.

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Reflection

This was my first time taking ownership of a development project with my current employer. Under the time constraint, there were some major lessons I pulled from this experience. First, communication is key. Externally, it helped me to understand what the clients need from our service; internally, it allowed me to understand the limitations and constraints on the software development side. Also, the ability to present clear and concise information to key decision makers is important in a competitive market such as this.

 

Before this project, our company was focused on providing a product that exceeded the client’s expectation in relation to functionality but not so much on the user flow and user interface. By recommending to my supervisor that we focus on UX/UI we were able to reorganize our workflow which in turn sped up the development cycle by eliminating time spent on redesigning the product after implementation.
 

Taking the lead on this project has allowed me the opportunity to experience a lot of professional growth in a short period of time. There is no greater feeling than knowing that I am providing the company value and positively impacting the direction in which we are headed.

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Design Process

Information Gathering

After about a month of enterprise product testing, I interviewed a few doctors about the pain points with the current system to gather their thoughts on what could be improved. With the basic knowledge of why and how the client wants the mobile application to be built, I thought it would be best to go with a minimal design application with all the pertinent information that doctors would need on hand while conducting a patient visit.

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Get Approval from Stakeholders

I make up a design team of one which means I act as the liaison between the owner and the clients, work closely with the engineering team and provide on-site support to clients when needed.

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Due to the constraints and limited resource, all parties agreed on keeping some core features:

  • View Patient Information

  • Scheduling

  • Dictation

  • View Clinical Notes

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Sketches and User Feedback

Due to the rapidly approaching deadline, I tried to utilize my knowledge of the LEAN UX process by iterating ideas and creating quick user testing on paper sketches. I then solicited feedback from the physicians and improved the workflow in a timely manner.

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User feedback from testing on the wireframe

The intended primary user is a doctor or physician and a potential user would be their assistants. 

 

Following are the user stories:

  1. As a physician, I check the schedule and patient medical data before and during a patient visit.

  2. As a physician, I write clinical notes during and after a patient visit.

  3. As an assistant, I will check the patient history before a patient visit and alert the physician to anything requiring his or her attention prior to the visit.

  4. As an assistant, I will check the dictation results in the visit and record the difference.

 

 

 

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After gathering enough information, I started a mockup with Sketch. Since I interact with clients on-site, I understand the importance of having a simple and clean interface. Extensive features and simple design will surely boost end-user experience because it makes the product more intuitive.

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Wireframe Redesign

Sketch Mockup v3

 

For full prototype experience:  https://invis.io/4EM1TL0YAZJ

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Prototype and User Testing

During this phase of the workflow, I introduced the concept of UX to my manager. Luckily, we already operate in an agile environment. Collaborating with engineers to build the minimum viable product for me to complete user testing and gather feedback was an important step. By doing so, I was able to quickly iterate the product and eliminate a lot of the features that added minimal value to the product.
 

From there the product was pushed forward to the engineering team for development. I made sure to communicate that I was available to act as a resource for them during the development stage.

 

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