Narrowing the search for critical medications

After launching the Prescription Refill feature, I worked with the team to conduct a research study with active users.

The goal was to surface usability issues or points of confusion, specifically the refill flow, and how they use the tool day-to-day. This research helped uncover what was working, and find opportunities improvement on the design.

Left
Feature landing design before research was conducted.

Right
After research was complete, we rearchitected the screen to match the findings

Process

I conducted moderated studies with seasoned app users. I recruited users who had at least 2 VA prescriptions, and also recently requested a refill. In the sessions, I incorporated trauma-informed principles when working with study participants. Before the sessions, I worked with other researchers and VA social workers to review the test plan, and prepare for potential situations that may arise. I provided options to participants, like offering a secondary study design, which would entail a high-level discussion opposed to screen sharing. I offered support to other observers on my team by holding space to debrief after the session as needed.

When reviewing the initial design implementation, I uncovered some hypotheses that would aid in developing the research plan. I took note of the list of prescription statuses that may be present. The list included statuses with potentially similar meanings, like “On Hold, Parked, Discontinued, Expired”. Upstream data APIs often returned duplicative records, since the data was decentralized across many medical centers across the country. This caused some lengthy lists, which resulted in difficulty locating the needed prescription when scrolling–leading to task abandonment. 

Another hypothesis I considered related to the amount of competing interactions on the screen. The initial implementation organized the list with tab navigation in addition to a horizontal scroll area for filter buttons. I felt that this extra functionality added “noise” to the top 3rd of the screen, and dulled the impact of primary tasks, like the Start Refill button. To support my assumptions leading into the study, I paired with the team’s data analyst to validate usage stats and apply meaningful metrics to these potential issues.

Digital whiteboard to collect research findings as a remote team

Things that came up along the way

In the study, all participants successfully refilled their prescriptions since learning the tool after initial launch. However, they expressed friction when reviewing the full list to locate the particular prescription they needed.

Participants exclusively used those with an Active status to identify which were ready to refill. We witnessed other usability issues, and tracked the amount of users where it was an adverse effect that caused them to explore another refill method, like the phone or legacy websites.

Outcome

I worked with the product team to prioritise the updates. I presented our findings to the client and pharmacy stakeholders to determine the tradeoffs of our recommendations. I balanced user feedback with business constraints through mapping the updates into  Now / Next / Later categories. This way, we would not lose the findings as we moved onto other areas of the app.

.Now

  • Retool the default Sort method to surface Active prescriptions on the top, opposed to A-Z by medication name. 

  • Increase touch targets to meet user satisfaction and result in a successful tap to details. 

  • Simplify the Filter interaction in the absence of the ability to clean the data

  • Remove tab navigation to reserve the top part of the screen for the primary action

Next

  • Work with upstream services and medical centers to limit duplicative records. This would also have a positive effect on other tools that use the same data, like the legacy website.

  • Only show top line information on the list, like name, number and refills left. Reserve the rest for the detail screen.

Later 

  • Offer plain language solutions for content throughout the feature.

  • Use Secure Messaging (another app feature) to directly send refill/renew requests to their nurse.

Before (left) / After updates to the Filter + Sort overlay

Start refill request quick action (left) and dynamic filter interaction demo