feature improvement
Breaking down medical prescriptions
Problem
What began as a design exercise quickly became a real need for users of the SNS 24 app, a free mobile app that serves as the main digital gateway to Portugal's National Health Service (SNS).
While talking with users, I realized that the medical prescriptions feature was the one that caused them the most frustration. They couldn't figure out how many medications each prescription contained, and they were also confused by the different states of each one.
So I focused on understanding the information architecture of this feature to gain a better understanding of what each prescription contained and its purpose.
This is an independent improvement initiative with no direct connection to the team that developed the SNS 24 app.
User Research
Time was limited, so I conducted my research based on one-on-one interviews with users and observations of how they actually used the app.
Led individual conversations to learn more about each person’s goals while using the app, which features they used most often, and the challenges they encountered during their experience.
7
Regular users of the SNS 24 app who were interviewed
25-35 years old
Young people who are very comfortable using digital apps
55-70 years old
Adults who have some difficulty using digital apps
Key Solutions
Understand and structure the information architecture of medical prescriptions, in order to clarify their content and purpose.
Use Google Stitch to make the app's content editable, so I could work on those screens in Figma.
Find a more descriptive way to label the cards based on the content of each prescription, rather than relying solely on the first medication listed.
Simplify the disabled states of prescription cards, because, as users have admitted to me, they don't need that level of complexity.
Conclusion
Sometimes, a small change to the UI makes a big difference in the overall user experience, and that's exactly how I felt about this feature.
Despite the complexity of everything the SNS 24 app offers, some users reported that they found the app intuitive and functional, but as with any product, there is always room for improvement. I decided to highlight one of the issues users complained about the most, but there are actually a few others that could also be improved, according to users.
Realizing just how much improvements like this can impact people’s lives, especially in the healthcare sector, is what motivates me most to constantly push myself to become a better Product Designer.
Impact
Reduced prescription recognition time by 80% (from 10s to 2s), a 5x speed improvement while maintaining accuracy in identifying prescription type and medication count.
All users were able to identify the type of prescription listed and how many medications it contained without having to open the prescription.
The state of the medical prescription changed from uncertain to obvious, with only two states: active and inactive.
Thank you, next!
