Seattle Children's Hospital

Seattle Children's Search Optimization For Patients and Families

This student team will work to evaluate and optimize Seattle Children's mobile app and web page to allow patients and their families to easily and quickly search for relevant healthcare information in a clear and intuitive manner. The end product should prioritize equitable access, catering to a diverse audience with varying levels of digital literacy, making it easy for all users to find relevant content whether they are looking for general healthcare information regarding their stay, specific treatment details, or contact options for healthcare professionals. The primary motivation for this project is to improve the accessibility to digital content for our patients and families that come to Seattle Children's Hospital. As navigating through their healthcare journey can be stressful, Seattle Children's wants to empower their families and provide a "white glove" experience through their digital platforms that would allow them to quickly and reliably find information regarding their stay without facing unnecessary barriers. Seattle Children's hopes that by improving the accessibility to information they can enhance the patient experience and reduce information overload. This project would align with Seattle Children's department goals of improving patient experience and the likelihood to recommend. Project design parameters this student team will work to incorporate include: - Design a clean and intuitive mobile-first interface that allows for an intelligent way to search or retrieve digital content. - Provide the ability to filter or narrow search results, as well as the ability to search across different categories (locations, diagnoses, treatments). - Incorporate accessibility standards to ensure usability for individuals with disabilities. - Multilingual support. - Update Seattle Children's current Content Management app to support the features listed above. - Ensure the app is designed with security in the forefront, including HIPAA compliance, SSL encryption, and strong user authentication if needed. Performance criteria: -The design should allow for future expansion (new healthcare locations, services, languages, content). -The design should follow WCAG 2.1 accessibility guidelines and support localization. Project Scope: -Design and assist with search improvements for Seattle Children's current Mobile App (iOS and Android), leveraging Seattle Children's in-house developers and designers. -Design and assist with improvements to Seattle Children's Content Management App to support the new search features. -Designs will incorporate the ability to search, leveraging publicly available data sources such as Seattle Children's .org page and patient education database. -Designs will NOT incorporate direct integration with PHI (i.e., pulling clinical records into search). -Provide recommendations for improving search on Seattle Children's web page; however, the student team will work to focus on delivering the optimized search on mobile first. Design and work with Seattle Children's internal team to optimize search for the Seattle Children's Mobile App (iOS and Android). Design and work with Seattle Children's internal team to update the Content Management System for the Seattle Children's Mobile App, allowing for optimized search. Design and provide recommendations for seattlechildrens.org that can help support accessible and equitable search.