Ack! I too have ALL THE FEELINGS, and am currently looking for UX/IX/UI design work in non-profit for just exactly these reasons.

As it happens, in the not too distant past I designed screens with alerts for healthcare scenarios akin to the one mentioned in the original article, except that I actually had a chance to do it half-way right. It was a prototype designed for use on a pilot programme, with the possibility of expansion if funding could be found. No funding had been set aside expressly for the user testing phase, however. I created an interface based on the culmination of my knowledge of UX/IX/UI best practices and my own years of experience as a designer, and then strongly recommended that we test the interface with actual users. But no matter what I said, or to whom I spoke about the importance of user testing, there was no buy-in for it when the time for it arrived. It was ignored. The prototype is now in use, and it is apparently “working very well and everyone loves it,” which is exactly the vague and unhelpful feedback that will wind up moving the project forward to the next phase of funding and development — without adequate attention being given to those essential design changes that often emerge ONLY as a result of directed, professional user testing. Ack! Argh! Eeyaaaagh! Talk about frustration. I was there, right in it, and I did everything in my power to educate and/or enthuse the powers-that-were, even offering to do the testing myself at a sub-standard rate. But STILL it did not happen.

??????!!!!!!

That said, I am still committed to doing non-profit UX design. Why? Because it is the one thing I really wake up for. I will keep trying to get it right, because from time to time the planets align, the team is all on board, management “gets it”, the budget includes a UX line, and wonder of wonders, people’s lives are immeasurably improved.