Human Centered Design

Human Centered Design1 begins by asking the people living an experience to share their hopes, fears, and needs to uncover the most critical needs for their situation, then uses this as a starting point to propose solutions that are desirable, feasible, and viable.

In this way, one works at separating the symptom(s) from the real problem(s) to be addressed from the perspective of those experiencing the problems, rather than those who want to solve the problems.

When applied to cancer, Human Centered Design encourages digital health2 organizations to listen to your experience as a patient or caregiver, to ask follow on questions that help refine and evolve design so that solutions meet your needs where you are in your cancer journey, and to cultivate your network of care providers and community members, all in the service of empowering patients and caregivers as they face their cancer journey.

Human Centered Design

All digital health solution aim to encourage improved engagement and a sense of control over your health, and mindset change toward your approach to your health. Ultimately, your engagement in your treatment and use of digital health solutions “isn’t a reminder of the sickness; it’s how you get your life back – how you steal back the real you from cancer.” 3

At Rabble Health, we view this as Choice, Clarity, & Connection - It starts with putting patients and caregivers at the center. As a patient-focused platform, agnostic of institution or payer, we have an economic driver to help patients stay on the platform throughout their entire journey - meaning we need to continuously innovate to help create more utility for the patient throughout a cancer journey. We learn which advocacy organizations patients respond to.

We have a platform to help cancer patients access content specific to their disease (think Stage 2, HER2+, HR- Breast Cancer). And we have a moral obligation to help patients be in charge of how and with whom they share their data.

The patient chooses whether to include a professional or personal care team member. We include professional and personal support circles in our care teams so that the entire care team understands both clinical patient care information as well as information/services to navigate life as a cancer patient. We want patients and their caregivers to be empowered in shared-decision making discussions with rigorous and understandable scientific and clinical information. We want to help patients focus and engage in these shared-decision discussions, feeling confident that they also understand and can meet the emotional, financial, and logistical challenges of a cancer journey.

References

1. The Field Guide to Human-Centered Design
   https://www.designkit.org/resources/1

2. 5 Principles for Making Digital Healthcare More Human-Centered
   https://www.ideo.com/blog/5-principles-for-making-digital-healthcare-more-human-centered

3. Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard
   https://heathbrothers.com/books/switch/