January 2023 - May 2023
This project was the culmination of a semesters’ work in a mock tech startup incubation course (ITP466) at USC. As a team of 8 with a diverse set of academic backgrounds, we worked to create a business model together in a simulated startup setting.
CEO (team lead) / Design Lead / UX Designer
8 multidisciplinary USC students
Create a business model for a technology-based product. Present business model and prototype in a pitch to "stakeholders" at the end of the semester.
As a former caretaker of a grandmother with Alzheimer's, I proposed tackling the problem of constant caretaker anxiety of emergency situations and the knowledge gap that prevents first responders from giving proper patient care in the "golden window" of emergency situations. A few considerations we also brought up were:
"While older patients have unique medical needs, current EMS training curricula offer only limited training in geriatric care. An important first step in improving the EMS care of older persons is to understand the characteristics of these persons."
H.V. Duong, University of Alabama School of Medicine
We found a gap in the modern emergency healthcare's system ability to recognize, diagnose, and treat those with unique medical conditions at maximal efficiency. This also applies to those who suffer from a multitude of conditions that might be put at risk without proper and precise care. Thus, our goal for our solution was to minimize the amount of time between onboarding and medical treatment.
With physical monitoring bracelets that not only 1) provide real time health insights and 2) are scannable for patient medical records, we had a vision to completely rewrite the health gadget scene.
The GOband is a health and activity tracker that provides first responders critical medical information in case of emergency. Combined with the mediGO app, track your loved ones and receive real-time notifications and alerts. Our vision for this band was for it to be a multifunctional yet lightweight wearable that could compete with products like the Fitbit and the Apple Watch by being monitorable by users other than the wearer.
For the first few weeks of the course, we were expected to collaborate and finalize what features we would want our application to have. In order to accomplish this, we had to not only complete logistical efforts to understand our market, but also make empathetic efforts by reaching out and gaining insights.
Two core values that we decided to place at the forefront of our brand were:
1. Accessibility.
Considering that our target audience for our products are medical dependents - those who rely on caretakers for survival - we recognized that a majority of our users would be at the two extremes of the age spectrum (>10yrs and <60yrs). With this understanding, one of our priorities especially in user experience and interface design was to make the data easily accessible and emergency features easy to use.
2. Usefulness.
While we are competing against major companies in the "health gadget" scene, we recognized our brand's niche of being able to provide life-saving services between patient, caretakers, and medical responders. While we wanted to be intentional with how many features we would add on the band, we also wanted to make our services a hub to simplify healthcare for our users.
With these core values in mind, we began mapping out the ecosystem for our product, and adjusting based on loose ends we found. Unfortunately, we had to make some cuts in terms of features we were hoping to include for the sake of simplicity and projected cost per unit.
To summarize, our main product is the GOband, which is linked to the mediGO app. The GOband is intended for use by medical dependents, and the app can be used by both "patient" and "caretaker." On each GOband, there is a QR code and NFC chip (readable by most modern smartphones) that takes first responders to vital patient medical records via mobile web application.
After determining what functions we decided to add to the app, we began creating user stories that would theoretically map out how we expected each user (patient, caretaker, first responder) to interact with our application.
The key points we focused on during this stage of planning were 1). ease of access and 2). informational organization. We found it a little bit more difficult to empathize with our users in this stage because of our projected age range (60-80yrs), but filled those gaps by studying the UX of other applications and websites that had a similar target audience. We also made sure to plan out each step of the onboarding process in an effort to make it simple from the get go.
Now that we had a clear vision of where we wanted to take our product, one of our first supplementary steps was to create a low-fidelity prototype to take along to our user interview phase.
Linked below is the slide deck we used to pitch our product, complete with our company's vision and business plan. While we presented this to the class and professor, our intended target audience were potential investors for our product.
This project definitely came with a unique set of challenges and hurdles, but I believe with greater expectations comes greater room for growth. I had so much fun during this project because I was able to experience bringing a product from a simple idea to life. Because I brought on the idea of the product from my own personal experience as a caretaker for my grandmother, I was able to draw from my own personal experiences and drafted the GOband and mediGO app based on aspects that would have made our lives earlier - what better reason to design?
One of my greatest takeaways from this project is the importance of strong team chemistry and trust. While I joined this class with the goal of implementing and practicing my knowledge in design, I was unable to focus on that aspect because I was being spread out with other responsibilities. As the CEO. I learned that each individual in a professional space is equipped with their own strengths, and it is the responsibility of those in leadership to guide them along that path in order to create the best possible product. I think the one thing I struggled with the most was pushing my team to attempt things outside their area of expertise (and not just doing it myself). However, at the end of the day, I had to delegate the things I couldn't do and trust in their abilities, while providing support when needed.
On the other hand, one thing that I realized I need to work on is my understanding of design systems and how they govern certain rules for a project. This was one aspect I had to inevitably neglect due to my lack of bandwith as the CEO, design lead, and UX designer. I wish I was able to spend more time on creating a founding system that I could base my interface on, but was ultimately unable to and designed from scratch.
However, I have no regrets with how the project turned out and the immense insight I gained from my roles. Thank you for following along with me on this journey!
Best,
Rachel
