CHALLENGE: How can we save time and be efficient when delivering products to the nursing staff when needed?
MY ROLE: Research, Wireframing, UI Design, and Prototyping.
TOOLS: Sketch, Invision, pencil, paper, and sticky notes.
DURATION: 3 Weeks
Overview
As an employee at St. Joseph’s Health Medical Center, I work as a Distribution Clerk where I inventory each hospital unit and receive orders from the nursing staff. On a daily basis, the hospital is visited by travel nurses who will request for medical supplies and devices from distribution often times without specifying the name of the item and not knowing how many of those items are available. With this common occurrence, I decided to use my UX background and apply what I learned from my time at General Assembly to come up with this distribution app.
I designed two different user flows for the distribution app: one for the nursing staff and one for the distribution team. The distribution app for the nursing staff will help nurses better communicate with the distribution team by taking out the guesswork of knowing what the actual name(s) for the item(s) they request are. By allowing the nursing team access to the hospital’s inventory, the nursing staff will know what’s available and which items are currently on backorder. The distribution side will use the app to receive notifications from the nursing staff about what items are being requested, which items need to be replenished, and how many items are in stock.
Research
Having a background as a Distribution Clerk I thought “How can I combine my background with UX and Central distribution together?” From there I conducted user interviews with my colleagues and as well with nurses on a few units. The main topic I heard from the nurses were the time of delivery on items and if we carried a specific item. For Central Distribution they currently receive phone calls from nursing staff and when Central Distribution can’t answer the calls, they leave a message and sometimes the messages aren’t received a quick response, now having the nurse waiting for a response on their item.
Once I gathered my data, I conducted an affinity map with my responses then formed a User Flow for both the Nursing staff and for Central Distribution.
ITERATION
After running usability-testing with a sketch prototype, I added the Chat option where nursing staff would be able to get ahold of the Central Distribution staff for any product questions. This would help both nursing staff and Central Distribution connect for an easier way of communication if they needed an ETA on a delivery or of there was an alternative substitution if our original product was on backorder or out of stock. With repeated testing, my final design solved both the nurses and distributions problems where nurses received their supplies at a quicker time and distribution were more efficient on products that were delivered.
Design
Nursing Staff User Flow
Sketches | Nursing Staff
Early design stages I sketched out a few UI designs and chose what would be the best simplified and user-friendly.
Wireframes | Nursing Staff
When I agreed with the final sketch UI, I then started to build my design in Sketch to have a clearer idea of how this design would look.
Mockup | Nursing Staff
After running multiple iterations, I came up with the final mockup with these designs.
Central Distribution User Flow
Sketches | Central Distribution
Wire Frames | Central Distribution
Mockup | Central Distribution
PROTOTYPES
CENTRAL DISTRIBUTION
The Distribution prototype is an example of when a Distribution staff member receives an order from a nurse and for addressing questions asked by the nursing staff.
NURSING STAFF
The Nurse prototype is an example of ordering an item nurses need and sending questions to Distribution.
TESTING
In testing these app designs they were both beneficial to Central Distribution and the nursing staff as they would be in sync. This is especially important in a healthcare facility when supplies are urgently needed. Nurses would see what items Central Distribution would carry and have a clear picture and visibility into what supplies are available in inventory.
SOLUTION
The idea is to have nursing staff be able to communicate with Central Distribution with a mobile app so that nurses can request and receive items more quickly and efficiently, as well as know which items Central Distribution currently carries without the guesswork of what is currently available. The chat feature also has the capability to send pictures and this would be useful when identifying the needed items for both the nursing staff and distribution team.