Hospital for Special Surgery
During my time at AKQA, my team and I worked with Hospital for Special Surgery to create their first digital front door application, centralizing their many properties under the one roof.
Role
Product Design Lead
Platform
Native & Web Applications
Industry
Healthcare
Context
In their 150+ years, HSS has led the market in orthopedic care via embracing innovation, spiting an industry mired in red tape and clunky institutional powers.
In late 2020, HSS turned to my team at AKQA to unify their approach to online patient care. As it stood, a patient could encounter several disconnected digital properties before seeing a doctor. For patients focused on rehabilitation, this was a stressful and confusing journey.
A patient could move through HSS.edu, MyHSS native app, EPIC MyChart, MyHSS web app (yes, it’s different to the native app!), and SurveyGizmo, before seeing a doctor.
Problem
How could we streamline the patient experience to clear the path for recovery?
I worked closely with HSS’ technical and provider stakeholders; talking with everyone from their CEO to orthopedic specialists to identify the integrational constraints, organizational eddies, and opportunities.
My team and I mapped the user’s journey across HSS’ service landscape to ensure the technical handoffs and overall experience was fluid. From this, we identified eight users types and accommodated their differing priorities and feature sets into a single app.
The outcome was a feature rich, modular dashboard, accessible via app or the web. Amongst other things, the user could now book in-person and video appointments, message with their specialist, and manage their medical record, test results, follow-up actions, and bills, all in the same place.
UI, copy, and art direction were informed by the styling possibilities offered by the various technical architectures in use. Ensuring visual and tonal cohesion across the care journey was paramount in making the app a trusted home for the user’s rehabilitation.
Joy of Movement
Living life to the fullest with the body you have.
Warm, dynamic, optimistic imagery.
A Human Touch
HSS’ approach to individualized, compassionate care
Copy that supports, cadence and spacing that guides, daubs of calm, reassuring color
Expertise
Professionalism found in a world-class healthcare institution
Precise and clear functionality via simple informational and typographic hierarchy
Outcome
Initially released in March 2021, HSS’ digital front door met the urgent, pandemic-fueled need to digitally translate the patient experience. Where previously, the common path for a patient would be to call for an in-person appointment; now they could book and enter a virtual appointment all from the app. Patients who would have previously suspended in-person care could continue, patients outside the NYC metro area could now be serviced, and users previously befuddled by the scattershot of digital properties could keep track of their rehabilitation.
Credits
Gabe Beck, Paul Sieka