Many medication tracking apps on the market look like apps a caretaker would use for someone due to the number of screens involved. We wanted to provide an app that's intuitive and easy to use for elders by providing two simple functions.
Involved rapid prototyping, user interface design, design prototyping, and user testing.
We wanted to create an app that would help others and because multiple team members have experience a loved one go through heavy medication and tracking it, we decided to share this experience with others.
From online research and our personal experiences, we came up with a rough idea of who our target audience is and what their frustrations might be. We designed the app accordingly.
Key points:
Frustrations:
To begin our concept in the first couple hours, we started by looking at various top medication tracking applications on the Apple App Store that could help us find pain points we want to target to better design our product.
Findings:
Goals:
Our target audience was likely elders who do not know how to use smart phones very well and are not very technology literate. This swiping feature was decided due to it's simplicity and quick visual feedback.
As soon as the user moves their finger on the screen, the card will visibly move in the same direction, giving people rapid feedback based on their action. We wanted to stray away from small buttons and text that are hard to read or require accurate precision when navigating the touch screen space.
As a way to create ease of use, the main page is loaded immediately when the app is opened and offers two functions. The "Add New Medication" button goes to the second screen and the "Add" button takes the user back. Users will be able to indicate their medication name and dosage per day. The quantity per day is then represented by the amount of cards in the stack that the user must swipe through.
Adobe XD allowed me as a designer to prototype the functionality of the app and communicate that to the programmers. I was able to map out and test the designs I created. One thing that prototyping through Adobe XD helped redesign was the "swipe to take" placement. Downloading the XD prototype on my phone gave me the ability to walk to various groups at SwampHacks and have people physically test out the product before it's even built.
Some users were confused at first about which way to swipe because they wanted to place their finger where the arrow was. I mediated this by moving the arrow to the left (where I want users to place their finger) and pointing the arrow to the right (the direction I want users to move). Thus resulting in the design shown above.
Thinking simple and creating user experience through design. One of the functionalities we were contemplating was a system of notifiying the user if they had conflicting medications. The app would know to tell them not to take certain medications sequentially. I realized that rather than creating an entire notification system with more pop ups or extra flashy material, the user puts their trust into the apps hands.
If a certain medication conflicts with another, once the user takes the first medication, the conflicting card could simply be grayed out and unswipeable. Thus, not giving the user the option to take the medication.
