Enabling group visits functionality on VirtualCare
Group Visits Prototype being tested - On-call video experience
Group Visits Prototype being tested - On-call messaging experience
Background
March 2021 - Present
Think Research’s (TRC) VirtualCare (VC) application allows providers and patients to have virtual appointments in situations where in-person appointments/visits are not possible.
The onset of the pandemic meant providers couldn’t easily see patients in-person. While family doctors and therapists turned to VirtualCare as a solution, the app lacked a way for these professionals to have larger group calls with a patient and their family and/or other care providers.
Kicked off in April 2021, the group visits feature is currently undergoing a final round of evaluation with end users to validate how well the proposed solution addresses the problem statements defined.
My Role
As the Product Designer for VC, my role for this project focused on:
Collaborating with the Product, Engineering, Legal and Client facing teams to re-define the problem space against technical and business requirements alongside end user feedback.
Scoping out the design and development execution plan to enable group visits.
Building and user testing high fidelity wireframes with net new components within the existing design system for VirtualCare.
Defining metrics of success in FullStory to compare and track pre and post implementation.
The Challenge
Current state of VirtualCare
Group visits continues to be a highly requested feature from our clinical users across health sectors. 25% of end feedback received relates to this
As VC in current state allows no more than one provider and one patient can be on a video/audio call at any given time, this limits how it can be used by:
LTC nurses to discuss a resident’s care with their physician and physiotherapist
A therapist to provide couples counselling or group therapy with more than one person at a time
A family doctor to speak with an elderly patient and their family member
This limits the user adoption of VC across healthcare sectors and ultimately TRC’s market penetration.
Reviewing and Validating Existing Research & Discovery Work
Since a group visits feature had been explored before, I reviewed & validated existing research with internal stakeholders (Client Services, Business Development, Product, Engineering, and in-house Clinical teams) to better understand if the proposed solution was still topical given the shift in priorities due to the pandemic.
The previously proposed approach involved implementing a meeting link that could be sent to an unregistered user to join the visit while the experience remained unchanged for registered users (Patients and Providers).
Based on feedback from internal stakeholders, my takeaway was that this approach would not consistently support the needs of users across each healthcare sector VC is live in (LTC, Mental Health, and Primary Care). I made the decision to re-think and update the virtual visit model based on internal stakeholder and existing end user feedback.
Workflow map of previously proposed solution
Insights Gathered
I reviewed the previous design work and user feedback with internal stakeholders and took away the following.
#1 - Users without registered VC accounts should be able to join a group visit: Support for visits with external participants (i.e. a family member) who do not have registered accounts will be required to support the in-scope use cases for a broader implementation across healthcare sectors.
#2 - Users with registered VC accounts should also be able to join the visit: Support for visits with multiple users from one VC instance will be required to enable in-scope use cases in scenarios where all visit attendees have registered VC accounts. These scenarios are especially prevalent in the Mental Health and LTC sectors.
#3 - Special consideration is required for the LTC use case and workflows: A group visits feature will need to account for the nuances of LTC workflows where virtual discussions are taking place daily between Nurses and Clinicians without the direct involvement of the resident. With more than 100+ LTC homes currently using VC, group visits will be critical in ensuring that care teams can continue to look after their residents with minimal impact to existing workflows.
Defining Problem Statements
Based on the insights gathered, I worked closely with the Product Manager and the Engineering Lead for VirtualCare to define the following problem statements. The team and I decided to tackle problem statements in a phased approach (numbered below).
Design & Technical Approach
Implementing a group visits feature has turned out to be a massive undertaking with each of the 3 problem statements requiring 2-3 months each to reach production. Working closely with the Product Manager and Engineering team lead, we further broke down the work required into technical phases and determined which of these will require wireframes.
Breakdown of technical and design approach to solving Problem Statement #1
Proposed Solution for Problem Statement #1
I have proposed that to maintain a consistent user experience, any VC user with a registered account should be able to join a virtual visit via a meeting link whereas an external participant without a registered VC account would need to join via a meeting link and PIN.
In line with popular video conferencing apps paradigms, this solution will reduce barriers faced by providers and staff in Primary Care, Mental Health, and LTC in pulling in a variety of different participants (i.e. family members, specialists, colleagues) into a virtual visit.
With an execution plan in place, I used Whimsical to map out the workflow for my proposed solution which I first and foremost validated with the Engineering team to ensure it was technically feasible and could be broken down further into manageable tasks. I then presented this back to internal stakeholders where I received alignment to proceed further.
Summarized version of Whimsical workflow mapping
Proposed virtual visit model revamp in order to enable group visits functionality
VirtualCare User Definitions and Visit Access under the proposed model
Ideation (Problem Statement #1)
I ideated potential designs for phase 5 from the approach outlined above to directly address problem statement #1. The goal was to test an “ideal version” of group visits with end users.
First round validation of wireframes
Second round validation of wireframes
Third round validation of wireframes
Evaluation (In Progress)
I am currently synthesizing insights from my interviews with end users from LTC homes, Mental Health practices, and Primary Care clinics to better understand whether the proposed solution properly addresses Problem Statement #1.
Below are the key metrics and KPIs I have defined for tracking using FullStory both pre and post implementation to production.
