Bluebook: An interactive journal for the emotional well-being of prostate cancer patients

Bluebook: An interactive journal for the emotional well-being of prostate cancer patients

Van Kruijssen, J.

Pasman, G.J. (mentor)
Jimenez Garcia, J.C. (mentor)
Corporaal, B. (mentor)

Industrial Design Engineering

Industrial Design

Master of Science Design for Interaction

2013-11-22

Cancer. Probably one of the most feared words when discussing your or a loved one’s health. It is needless to say that the diagnosis of cancer has a big impact on people. The diagnosis and treatment can cause a disruption in their emotional well-being, which can also distress their family and friends. This graduation project eventually focused on the emotional impact of prostate cancer. Prostate cancer is the most common type of cancer among men. Every year approximately 10,000 men in the Netherlands get diagnosed with prostate cancer. One in six men will get diagnosed with prostate cancer in their life, at an average age of 67. If the emotional well-being of prostate cancer patients is enhanced, the likelihood and significance of emotional distress, depression and anxiety can be reduced. The overall quality of life could be improved. Reducing the emotional disruption could also prevent any need for additional psychosocial care, which in the end could lead to a decrease in healthcare utilization and costs. The project was carried out at User Intelligence, an international user experience consultancy. User Intelligence is looking for ways to expand their knowledge of designing for the healthcare industry and its future developments, in particular the design of eHealth solutions. Designing for the healthcare industry can be complicated, due to the decentralized and complex network of stakeholders. At User Intelligence they have been developing a design approach that tries to take the (conflicting) interest(s) of different stakeholders into account and assesses the pain points and potential opportunities in the network. With this graduation project this approach has been put into practice. The main goal was to develop a successful eHealth solution that could reduce the emotional disruption among men with prostate cancer and support them with a sense of control. EHealth products and services in general can be a solution to enhance the quality of healthcare. They could meet the needs of different stakeholders in an efficient, effective and costs lowering way. However, the development of many eHealth solutions is technology driven and regularly misses a user-centered approach. Insights regarding the thoughts, feelings, needs and desires of prostate cancer patients and related stakeholders, like the physician, were gathered. These include the pain points and opportunities that were identified in the complete stakeholder network. • Patients would like to have more personal qualities in the communication with the physician; it is very much appreciated when a physician shows empathy. • Patients found the amount of information they received sometimes overwhelming. Complex details were often meaningless, lack a connection with the patient’s own situation and are difficult to retain. • Within in their families, men can be worried that their disease will distress others. Instead, they like to reassure their family and friends and don’t want other people to feel sorry. • Patients appreciate sharing prostate cancer experiences with peers; it supports them in making decisions. They don’t actively look for peers, because they feel a certain threshold for contacting strangers. • The workload on care providers is high. Physicians are not able to spend more time per patient and feel reluctant to work with new systems that don’t fit in their existing work activities. These insights formed the fundament of the design vision and gave the design exploration direction. Through ideation, concept development and user tests a final concept design was created: Bluebook. Bluebook is an online journaling platform for prostate cancer patients. It enables them to record, collect and reflect on their cancer related experiences, inform others about these experiences and discover relevant experiences of peers. Psychology literature suggests strong correlations between self-reflection and improved self-awareness, decision-making and overall quality of life. 1. With Bluebook the patient is able to inform his care provider(s) about the ins and outs of his personal situation anytime, anywhere. This enables the care provider to create more empathy with the patient. 2. Bluebook provides a continuous tailored feed of tips and thoughts of peers. This information is adjusted to the patient’s personal situation and embedded along his healthcare journey. 3. Patients can share (parts) of their collected experiences with family and friends through Bluebook. It enables patients to tell the bigger picture to different people with a simple action. 4. Through Bluebook patients are able to discover experiences of peers, with a low threshold. 5. The quality of the medical meeting can be increased when the care provider is better informed about the patient’s thoughts and feelings. An interactive prototype of Bluebook was build. It served as a testing tool, supported the decision-making and it gave insight in the interactions of the designed features. The first reaction of patients on Bluebook during tests was very positive. Their feedback matched with the gathered insights and assumptions that were used for the design. The ability to update family, inform the physician and exchanging experiences with peers were evaluated as very valuable. In the end all participants mentioned that they believe the value of using Bluebook would outweigh the effort. An interviewed oncologist expects that the potential impact of the concept on the emotional well-being of the patient and his family could be significant.

Cancer
Prostate
Emotional
Journal
Peers
Psychosocial
Psycho-oncology
Oncology
Urology
Interaction
User experience
Patient
Stakeholder map
Website
Reflection
Self-reflection
Personal Informatics

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:64f747b4-83bb-4d56-bd6f-6ff424310cdf

Campus only

Student theses

master thesis

(c) 2013 Van Kruijssen, J.