A young boy outdoors holding a white air freshener to his face with his eyes closed.

“I just feel my anxiety is going off the rails. I’m constantly questioning what is just a regular toddler cough, what is an asthmatic cough…”

PARENT PROBLEM

85%

increase in ease of connection

users felt the flow and app was inviting and intuitive

100%

PLAY WITH APPLICATION

AsthmaConnect

THE SOLUTION

Project aim:

  • To address inadequate support or direction for parents of children with asthma and asthma-like symptoms through typical Google searches

My initial research suggested:

  • Lack of support

  • Difficulty finding answers or direction

  • Leading to burnout and worry among caregivers

  • Turning to Reddit & Quora

Task Completion

5 of 6 users were able to complete the task of logging in and finding a group successfully.

Efficiency

4 users said they completed the expected task in under 5 minutes.

All users said they would like to have a place to go specifically for this purpose to save burnout.

Conceptualizing

Finding that doing some whiteboarding to conceptualize the connection tool helped get focus on what the app should do and where it should start. Helped narrow down the immediate needs that solved the problem of lack of connection for parents and caregivers.

RESEARCH DETAILS

A chart illustrating the symptoms, concerns, and caregiver actions related to asthma in children, showing a progression from wellness to diagnosis to illness, with sections for asthma patient, concerned parent, caregiver, school nurse, pediatrician, and pulmonologist.

Competitive and Comparative Analysis

While undergoing competitive and comparative analysis, I found that there wasn’t a focused place to connect with others in this situation. For these parents, this could be life or death of whether or not to bring in their children to the ER. Having a place for reassurance and connection matters.

A collage of research and analysis slides about social listening research on asthma-related pain points, including competitive analysis and mobile app features.

Unmoderated Usability Testing

By putting this in the hands of 6 participants after the initial phase helped narrow our focus and brought to light that they wanted it more usable on mobile and they wanted more; more features, more ways to connect, and more resources.

A detailed screenshot of a usability testing report for a mobile app, featuring sections with user feedback, test results, and annotations for users of different ages and their parents. The document includes text, chat interfaces, and visual examples of user interactions.

Refinement using:

  • Design heuristics

  • User feedback via usability testing

Feedback changes made:

  • Added notifications

  • Updated the design to be more responsive and mobile-friendly

  • Included more detail in the ‘What’s coming next?’ section on the “Learn More” on the main homepage telling users what’s coming up

Feedback implementation examples:

Comparison of trending topics on a social media platform before and after a change, with categories like "Back to School Tips" and "Winter Preparation," each showing the number of posts.

When the browser is resized, fixed alignment of Trending topics

Comparison of a web page before and after a design change. The page belongs to AsthmaConnect and features a community forum with a list of trending topics and options to join or discover groups. The 'Before' version has a 'My Groups' section with no groups joined and a 'Discover Groups' button, while the 'After' version displays a 'Discover Groups' button directly and a message indicating no groups joined yet.

Adding more intuitive “how to” find Groups to the blank state

Screenshot of the AsthmaConnect website homepage with a blue and green color scheme, featuring a supportive community for parents and caregivers of children with asthma, and an illustration of a family of four walking outdoors among trees.

Notifications added to the dashboard to be able to see when the logged in user has a connection request.