Prototype I: Presentation
This week I presented prototype I tackling communication between people living with MS and their network of supporters.
This would be the homepage of the app. The screens on the left are patient-facing. The emoticons are suggestive of how the patient might identify feeling at the moment, prompting them to select an emotion and when they hold down a certain option, they are able to further decide if they are feeling very sad or miserable, for example, as shown in the screens. The idea here is that the moods of the patients are collected to see what the friends look like from day-to-day and week-to-week.
The patients are then prompted to further explain why they are feeling the way they selected, in the form of writing in a journal. This is accomplished by either typing right into the notebook or using voice recognition which is then transcribed into text. These are journal entries which is a very common practice amongst people living with MS, who are trying to journal there every day journey on personal diaries or some other format of personal writing. The screen on the right shows an average of moods and changing feelings throughout the days and weeks. The little dots on the bar graphs are indicators that the patient recorded detailed explanation of something that triggered the said feeling. For example in this screen, we see that the patient was having a bad day and feeling very alone.
On the other hand, the patient is able to establish a network of trusted family members and friends who are able to login and see a version of the dashboard including what the patient is feeling right now, dependent on the patient’s inputs throughout the day. They are also given the option to input their own patient data, if they happen to be around them, and add their own details as they see fit. This would be a useful feature for caregivers living with patients who can input information on days that the patients don’t feel up for it or are too tired or emotionally distant.
On a day that their loved one is feeling down or sad, they are granted quick responses such as sending a message or digital hearts signaling love, or even a direct option to call them. If given permission from the patient, they’re also able to read the journal entry from their loved one to gain some perspective on how and why they’re feeling a certain way.
Certain words in journal entries can be set up to get counted. These are words decided by the patient and their network. The word count is another indicator of common words and phrases being used by the person living with MS which is great to gain insight into patterns about what they are thinking about, their expressions and feelings. The app would also give information to the network for better educating themselves on a variety of topics for example, on days that the patient does not feel very well. The screen on the left shows is an example of such a screen, showing the supporters what to do on days that the patient is feeling sad. With this feature, I am hoping to lead the conversation from identifying triggers and to eventually better education and awareness about the symptoms and effects from MS.
Concluding thoughts
The overall result from this direction I’m hoping to see is that if it leads to a better communicative path between the person living for MS and their supporters. This includes their moods, feelings and hopefully, triggers which they will write in their journals. This is a common behavior/habit which MS patients establish as a form of expression and I’m hoping to use this as a key feature of this app. By making these moods/feelings available for their network to see, I’m hoping to decrease the misunderstandings that both sides experience. I am hoping to see the support network feel empowered to address certain moods quicker and better, being well-informed when the person living with MS might not be able to express exactly what’s on their mind at all times through verbal communication.
