OC- Detect
An internship where consultants build three products for a oral cancer detection company
September 2023 internship
My Role Team lead, Lead designer
Project Overview
OC-Detect is a low-cost oral cancer screening product by Benten Technologies to help at-risk individuals for early detection. Their target group is citizens of India, where the usage of tobacco and smokeless tobacco is very high. The client’s hope is to have an easy-to-use and accessible app to bring more awareness to the population and incentivize people to do more routine screening.
Benten Technologies would like the team to utilize user-centered design to further improve their lo-fi wireframes for three types of users: patients, clinicians, and health care workers.
**Note: some information has been omitted due to an intellectual privacy clause
Task
Project Scope
Lo-Fi Wireframe Improvements, Create Design Systems
Team
Self directed, with guidance from mentors and client
Duration
4 Weeks; September 2023
Improve 2 mobile apps for OC-Detect that are user-centered, clean, and easy
Improve a web design for the company’s physician users
Design mood boards and style guides for all 3 products
Objectives
01 Research
Primary and Secondary research material was supplied by our client which included: qualitative and quantitive analysis, surveys, focus groups, etc.
Market Research
India has a huge problem with oral cancer due to high alcohol and tobacco consumption
It is estimated that 267 million people in India use tobacco
Cancer are a stigmatized illness that drives for the delay in getting screened
Background
Ages 40-70 are at risk for OC due to this age ranges high alcohol and tobacco consumption
Individual diagnosed with early-stage oral cancer
Users 18-30 who are smart phone adept to assist with screening
Healthcare Physicians and Clinical Healthcare Workers
Demographic
Research Synthesis
Utilizing the research information provided by our client, we proceeded to create user personas for each of the three users we are building for. Each user had very specific needs to better their own experiences, creating user personas give us a way to have an outside lens in approaching a way to connect all three platforms to work cohesively.
User Personas
02 Strategy
One notable aspect to consider is that our client has supplied the team with low-fidelity wireframes. This bears significance due to the altered approach required in addressing the design process
Lo-Fi Wireframe
Physician Web Portal
Patient Mobile App
Healthcare Worker app
Equation used: Insight + Need = HMW
Utilizing the research, consulting with the client about their vision, creating user personas, and viewing the given lo-wireframes. We created HMWs to further our understanding of approaching the platforms. This allows for us to continuously look back at prompts if we ever begin to steer away from the design goal.
How Might We
After consolidating all information, the next step was to reconvene and discuss the comparison between our client’s goals and the user’s goals. This step allows us to create a visual representation of the similarities in objectives between the two parties, enabling us as designers to determine our priorities
Project Goals
03 Prototype and Style
We styled for 2 different users health workers and patients. What was an intersection of both users was the essence of “family”. For a topic highly stigmatized it was important for our users to feel safe in “family”. They come together as one unit to overcome a sensitive topic. This lets us think about what emotions or colors illicit family; all the while keeping a professional touch.
Moodboard and Style Guide
Patient Mobile App
Physician Web Portal
Style Guide
Mid-fidelity Prototype
Patient Mobile App
Healthcare Worker app
Designing our mid-fidelity prototype was the best way to get the most hands on feedback on what our client wanted and also gave the team and I leverage to building a better Hi-fidelity Prototype. After conducting our mid-fidelity prototype with our client here are a few of the main tasks that need to be implemented:
Make both mobile apps more cohesive with one another
The oral screening appeal needs to be enhanced and more aesthetically appealing
The bloated surplus features in the physician dashboard need to be condensed and aligned with the client’s features
Mid-fidelity Prototype Results
04 Hi-fidelity
05 Final Thoughts
With the final prototype, my team and I created, I believe we have met all of the goals outlined from the beginning of our design process. We created design systems for our client and executed three platforms for their project around oral cancer.
This experience with working with real-world clients has given me so much perspective on my own skills as a designer and how I can see myself navigating in this field. Taking the role as a team lead and delegating tasks for my team and me, communicating with our client about the tasks or issues that need to be resolved, and overall taking a more active position to practice advocating for our design decision have all been a steep learning curve that I know I will take with me in future endeavors.
Final Thoughts
Due to project time constraints, my team and I were not able to execute hi-fidelities for the healthcare worker app, therefore our next steps would be to complete that portion. Another part that the team would have done more would be to add extra features to all platforms to create an even better prototype.