how might we
Give moms access to clinical health data to help them better manage their child’s health and wellbeing?
RESEARCH SESSIONS
MOTHERS
HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
New moms experience a lot of stress as they try to figure out what “healthy” means for their children
New moms tend to worry about everything
All of a sudden, mothers become concerned about all sorts of things, such as feeding, milestones, and bowel movements. All of this new information can be overwhelming and confusing.
Naturally, moms feel a deep sense of personal responsibility when it comes to overseeing their child’s wellbeing
Mothers are on high alert in the first six months of a child’s life. Everything they do during this period is concerned with ensuring their baby thrives.
“When there’s this being who can’t really communicate what’s wrong, but they are fully dependent on you… it’s really exhausting. You’re never sure you’re doing the right thing.”
A Mothers’ health is tightly linked to her child’s health
A mother’s health and mental wellbeing is highly related to her child’s health and wellbeing – if the child isn’t sleeping or growing well, mothers also don’t sleep well and worry.
“You want to record everything because it’s all new and you can’t remember what happened two days ago. Maybe the baby’s not sleeping well… which means you’re not sleeping well.”
Mothers don’t feel like they have the information they need to be in control of their child’s health.
For mothers, control means having health information that is…
Convenient
To mothers, convenience means being able to have all of their health information in one spot that is easily accessible.
“When you get questions from their pediatrician or their health care provider, you can pull it all up in one spot.”
Consistent
Often the burden of relaying health information is placed on moms.
“You’re just crossing your fingers and hoping that [they remember not to prescribe something that they’re allergic to].”
Credible
Mothers find online sources helpful for experiential information such as sleeping and feeding, but not necessarily credible.
“I’d really like to deal with facts when I’m trying to find something out about my baby.”
Contextualized
Moms do not know how clinicians value data, so they often have little sense of what to track or whether what they are tracking is relevant.
“I was better at keeping track in the first weeks because I wanted to do everything that the hospital told me since I didn’t know any better.”
so we asked ourselves…
What does giving mothers control over health information look like in a tangible, concrete form?
MOTHERS
HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONALS
HEALTH INNOVATORS
PROTOTYPES MADE
Through co-creation, we also learned that whatever we made needed to be…
Centralized
We noticed that mothers didn’t see their child’s health as one singular metric (e.g. just feeding or sleeping). They saw it as an entire package, and preferred that information be displayed in the same way.
Flexible
Different children have different needs – one might have trouble sleeping, while another may struggle to feed regularly. Our solution had to be highly modular to accommodate diverse needs.
Contextualized
The solutions had to provide context around what to track, and why. This would allow mothers to become more aware of what doctors evaluate during clinical checkups.
The prototypes evolved and changed with each iteration…
Centralize everything, based on milestones
We first built out the milestones tracker because we thought everything – feeding, sleeping, and all of a child’s data – fell under this category. We also included features that addressed more experiential and emotional needs, such as advice and suggested activities.
Mobile first
We initially built our prototype on an iPad, but the principle of mobile first forced us to cut down on our features and really question what the core functionality should be. To streamline the prototype, we removed all of the experiential advice and suggested activities. We made tracking a core function of the app.
What is this?
After refining the feature set, we realized that the solution was generic and lacked any differentiating benefits. This made it difficult for us to articulate the value of the solution.
The prototype ultimately broke
This taught us that data and technology couldn’t (and shouldn’t) replace…
Social support
Experiential advice is best provided through mommy support groups and friend circles. We couldn’t replicate what face-to-face interaction does best.
The doctor
The customized timeline concept tried to make medical judgments about a child’s development without actually consulting a doctor, which is something we didn’t want this platform to do.
We re-evaluated and focused on what data and technology could do best…
Give mothers access to personal and clinical health data in one centralized location
Centralized in one place
Mothers can use the main passport app to see all of their child’s personal and clinical data, getting an overall view of their child’s health.
Create Flexibility
Mothers can download any of the relevant tracking apps that help her manage her child’s health.
Access Health Info
Allow mothers to access their clinical information, and have it in a contextualized and digestable format.
Share with Caregivers
Seamlessly transfer information between different doctors and caregivers, all within the app.