OVERVIEW

About the Company

Hawai'i Hand & Rehabilitation Services is a private practice outpatient hand therapy clinic. They have two locations in Hawai'i. This company treats hand and upper extremity injury for patients of all ages, and works closely with several hand surgeons to ensure most effective care. Approximately 50% of the patient base is aged 65+ and thus insured by Medicare. 

Why this redesign?

This company's website had not been updated since 2015 and felt outdated. Intake and evaluation forms for patients to fill out were hosted on this website which speed up the initial evaluation process and improve therapist productivity as they do not have to wait for the patient to fill out the paperwork in the clinic. The company was receiving consistent feedback that it was difficult to navigate the website to find these forms. This company is one of the best hand therapy clinics in the state of Hawai'i and the website did not reflect this reputation. 

Goals & Motivations

Design Goals:

• To deliver a seamless and intuitive UI design

• To modernize the website for improved company first impressions

Personal Growth Goals:

• To take full ownership of the various roles involved in designing a product

• To challenge my design decisions based on the known user base and preferences of the company owner 

Website Analysis

Observations

There is quite a bit of unused space on either side of the center modules. As a result, the text is small and could be difficult to read for those with visual impairments (age related or otherwise). The orange menu bar feels clunky and dated. 

Understanding the User through User Interviews

User Demographics

Because I am not affiliated with HHRS, I do not have access to official data about patient demographics. I am making educated guesses based on the demographics of the state of Hawai'i and my own experience working in a hand therapy clinic in Hawai'i.

Conducting User Interviews

I wanted to better understand the common pain points and user needs felt by users navigating through healthcare websites. Due to HIPAA privacy laws, I was unable to interview people who had navigated through the site as patients. Therefore, I conducted a short telephonic survey with a population representative of the patient load at HHRS. I interviewed ten users were interviewed, five of whom were over the age of 65. All users interviewed currently live in Hawai'i. The survey questions were as follows:

1. How do you go about looking for healthcare providers?

2. How important is it to you that a healthcare clinic have a website? 

3. What functionality do you expect to see from a healthcare company's website?

4. What have you found frustrating about navigating through healthcare websites?

5. What features have you found helpful about navigating through healthcare websites?

Key Insights

• Most participants reported utilizing several methods for finding healthcare providers. The majority (70%) reported they searched the web for healthcare providers. Other common answers included getting a referral from their primary care doctor (30%), getting recommendations from friends and family (30%), and choosing based on close proximity to their household (10%). 

• Eighty percent of the participants felt it was very important for a healthcare clinic to have a website. 

• All participants expected to be able to find contact and location information on the website. Half of participants expect to be able to request an appointment on the website itself without needing to call in. A third of participants expected to see information about the providers treating at the clinic so that they can choose who to make an appointment with. 

• The most common pain point mentioned in this survey was difficulty finding contact information due to poor organization.

• The most common helpful feature mentioned in this survey was a map of where the clinic is located (this response was most common amongst the older participants). Another frequently mentioned feature was information about what kind of treatments they might receive at that clinic. One user stated that she Googles her conditions and wants to be able to receive specific treatments, so it is helpful for her to know if her desired treatment is available.

User Persona

Following user interviews, I completed the following user personas to guide my design. 

DEFINE

Pain Points

To further understand pain points and bottlenecks, I wanted to analyze how people interacted with this design. I asked three users to complete the following tasks in the HHRS website:

• Locate the address of the clinic

• See if they treat distal radius fractures

• Request an appointment

• Download the intact forms

Pain Point 1: Design is small and difficult to see
Due to the middle module taking up only about a third of the page, several users complained that the font was too small for them to read comfortably.

Pain Point 2: Not enough information listed on the website
Two users reported the website felt bare and didn't have enough information 

Pain Point 3: UI is cluttered and confusing on some pages
Three users complained that they had a difficult time downloading the intake forms because there were so many buttons. It was difficult to remember which forms they had already filled out. 

Pain Point 4: Design feels dated
Two users reported that the design felt dated, which makes him wonder if the equipment and facilities are also dated. 

User Needs

Based on the user interview and usability study, several user needs and expectations became apparent:

• Users expect there to be a visual map of the location of the clinic

• Users need the contact information and address to be easily located

• Users expect the ability to read about and choose their healthcare providers

• Users desire to be able to schedule appointments digitally without needing to phone in

IDEATE

Sketches

I utilized the Crazy Eights activity to brainstorm design layouts and ideas. 

PROTOTYPE

High Fidelity Prototype

Design Changes

I removed the white space from the sides of the website and was therefore able to increase the font size. This will improve ease of access for older adults who may be experiencing vision loss or decline. I created a clean white background and utilized the colors in the company's original logo for the primary and secondary colors to keep everything consistent. 

On the home page, I included more information about the company and the services it provides. Hopefully, this information will give patients an idea of what will happen when they do arrive and help them feel confident for their evaluation. I updated the banner to a modern picture of the clinical building, so that patients will have a visual reference on their first drive to the office. Lastly, I included a contact form on the first page, so that prospective patients can quickly request a visit without needing to navigate to any other pages. 

On the services page, I elaborated on the types of treatments and modalities utilized at the clinic, again to ease patient's mind by giving them information about what treatments they may receive. 

On the forms page, I consolidated the forms for all patients into one button, with the intention of having a zip file or folder download to the patient's computers. With multiple buttons, patients may have difficulty remembering which file they have already downloaded. I added an explanation over the specialized Medicare questionnaire indicating they Medicare patients need to download that form in addition to all the other forms. 

The content of the contact page remained essentially the same, however the design was changed to remain consistent with the rest of the website. 

I added the ability to make an appointment digitally based on user feedback. 

Final Thoughts

I have thoroughly enjoyed this website redesign. It was nice to have direction in terms of visual design and overall message. Since I completed this unsolicited redesign, this company has actually updated their website. It has a similar feeling to my redesign, which makes me feel like I made some good design decisions and that they would have liked my design!