Empathy Design in Skills Assessment tool for Recovery and Rehabilitation
Gautam, Ashutosh (2019)
2019
Tietotekniikan DI-ohjelma - Degree Programme in Information Technology
Informaatioteknologian ja viestinnän tiedekunta - Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2019-11-21
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-201910304216
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-201910304216
Tiivistelmä
Empathy has become a major concern in the modern world where most of the services are digitized as information is primarily shared from behind the screen. In the healthcare sector, patient and healthcare provider’s interaction is among the most powerful and emotional experiences any of us can encounter. Healthcare providers try to adopt different strategies to empathize with the patient, but the digital technology creates a bridge between patients and caregivers. The prevalent challenge and opportunity for the healthcare system is closing the gap between humans by facilitating emotional connection with the help of technology.
In this research, we present empathy as a vital skill for healthcare workers, for designers as well as for people suffering from substance use disorder and going through recovery and rehabilitation. We try to identify processes on how designers can better empathize with the users by following Kouprie and Vissier’s framework on empathy design. The objective is to identify how the process of empathy design is used not just to understand the users, but during design and while communicating the findings with the stakeholders.
The empirical work carried out in this thesis is aimed to enhance the user experience of existing skills assessment application, LivingSkills. LivingSkills has been developed as a skills assessment and monitoring tool, where patients can plan their own recovery by developing the skills they need with the help of healthcare personnel or caregiver. The tool helps to understand the patient’s and caregiver's journey throughout a system – understand the patient’s journey to recovery, visualize their skill level and find out ways to provide better skills coaching service.
User experience of the LivingSkills tool was evaluated at SiltaValmennus (rehabilitative coaching service / recovery home) to improve the condition of residents who were serving the last term of their sentences in prison and were going through drug recovery and rehabilitation program. UX evaluation questionnaires such as AttrakDiff and user satisfaction questionnaire along with multiple rounds of semi-structured interviews were conducted with various stakeholder groups in order to uncover user needs and problematic areas during application use. We implemented the applicable solutions by closely following ISO 9201-210 human-centred design process. We assessed how the perception towards the application changed before and after the empathic redesign approach. We then evaluated overall experience of the application with users (n=7) with the help of AttrakDiff, user satisfaction questionnaire and series of semi-structured interviews with the stakeholder group including residents (n=4) and staff members (n=3), iterating the design whenever necessary. We found that the LivingSkills application was viewed as a positive tool for skills training among the residents as well as staff members at the recovery home. There were multiple areas of opportunities within the application such as giving patient’s access to their own record, improving visual designs, using responsive layout and humanizing the interaction dialog by using faces and carefully selecting texts to facilitate the empathic exchange of information. The findings were prioritized and implemented based on user needs, importance and effort required to implement the solution within the research timeline.
We found out that the user experience has improved but the difference in perception was not statistically significant among the residents and healthcare workers We have suggested some extension of product features with the possibility to integrate existing healthcare procedure implemented by the organization. We found out that the application is oriented towards healthcare providers to enable residents to get the help they need for better outcomes. Asking questions, providing opportunities for feedback, listening, and taking notes are intended features of the application itself which demonstrate empathy to the patients, showing them that their voices are being heard through the use of LivingSkills application.
In this research, we present empathy as a vital skill for healthcare workers, for designers as well as for people suffering from substance use disorder and going through recovery and rehabilitation. We try to identify processes on how designers can better empathize with the users by following Kouprie and Vissier’s framework on empathy design. The objective is to identify how the process of empathy design is used not just to understand the users, but during design and while communicating the findings with the stakeholders.
The empirical work carried out in this thesis is aimed to enhance the user experience of existing skills assessment application, LivingSkills. LivingSkills has been developed as a skills assessment and monitoring tool, where patients can plan their own recovery by developing the skills they need with the help of healthcare personnel or caregiver. The tool helps to understand the patient’s and caregiver's journey throughout a system – understand the patient’s journey to recovery, visualize their skill level and find out ways to provide better skills coaching service.
User experience of the LivingSkills tool was evaluated at SiltaValmennus (rehabilitative coaching service / recovery home) to improve the condition of residents who were serving the last term of their sentences in prison and were going through drug recovery and rehabilitation program. UX evaluation questionnaires such as AttrakDiff and user satisfaction questionnaire along with multiple rounds of semi-structured interviews were conducted with various stakeholder groups in order to uncover user needs and problematic areas during application use. We implemented the applicable solutions by closely following ISO 9201-210 human-centred design process. We assessed how the perception towards the application changed before and after the empathic redesign approach. We then evaluated overall experience of the application with users (n=7) with the help of AttrakDiff, user satisfaction questionnaire and series of semi-structured interviews with the stakeholder group including residents (n=4) and staff members (n=3), iterating the design whenever necessary. We found that the LivingSkills application was viewed as a positive tool for skills training among the residents as well as staff members at the recovery home. There were multiple areas of opportunities within the application such as giving patient’s access to their own record, improving visual designs, using responsive layout and humanizing the interaction dialog by using faces and carefully selecting texts to facilitate the empathic exchange of information. The findings were prioritized and implemented based on user needs, importance and effort required to implement the solution within the research timeline.
We found out that the user experience has improved but the difference in perception was not statistically significant among the residents and healthcare workers We have suggested some extension of product features with the possibility to integrate existing healthcare procedure implemented by the organization. We found out that the application is oriented towards healthcare providers to enable residents to get the help they need for better outcomes. Asking questions, providing opportunities for feedback, listening, and taking notes are intended features of the application itself which demonstrate empathy to the patients, showing them that their voices are being heard through the use of LivingSkills application.