Work Sample 1: In-Home Patient Application for Stroke Rehabilitation (Patient App)

Motivation:

5 million people suffer from a stroke worldwide each year.  Unfortunately for me, my father was one of those 15 million people. Time, transportation, and cost are three of the biggest challenges for stroke survivors worldwide.  I developed the Patient App as a response to the growing need for an in-home app to alleviate the pain points many stroke survivors face across the globe. I worked on developing this app from 2017 until 2021, and it was a zero-to-one product that I researched, designed, and built. 

Research question(s):

  1. How can an interactive app support the capture and assessment of human movement to assist with rehabilitation therapy in the home?

  2. What are the design implications of building assistive applications for older adults with disabilities?

Research goals:

  • Identify and understand the needs of stroke patients through the development process

  • Determine how to optimize the experience for patients in a way that replicates clinical care


Research & Design Methods:

  • 1:1 interviews,  Contextual Inquiries, Diary Studies, and Focus Groups


Number of Users:

  • 15 stroke survivors (mild to moderate impairment) 

  • 4 Occupational and Physical Therapists 

Outcomes of my work and project impact: 

  • The  Patient App has been evaluated at Emory Hospital and Virginia Tech. Outcomes from my work have resulted in an NSF grant of 1.5 million USD  

  • Ongoing work from this research has resulted in clinical in-home trials of the Patient App (end of 2023)

  • This work was awarded the William Preston Outstanding Thesis of the Year in Design in 2019

  • Research and Design from the Patient App have also resulted in me being awarded as an Intel Scholar, Adobe Scholar, as well as Walts Fellow. 

  • Featured on MIT Technology Review Brazil 

Patient Application. Acts as the “voice of the therapist”.

Redesign from feedback with patients and therapists:

Redesign of the Patient App to be more accessibly to elderly users and users who are color blind.

Patient Experience through using the Patient App.