Intercept Mobile App & Medical Device
Challenge
Epilepsy is a brain disorder which affects over 2 million people (in the United States alone). For many epileptics whose seizures cannot be controlled by medication, their only option is costly and invasive brain surgery.
Solution
Intercept is an EEG recording application that also turns a cell phone into a device to stimulate the brain and to interrupt seizures.
Task & Tools
Concept, User Research, Branding, Persona’s, Wireframes, User Testing, Prototyping, Responsive Landing Page, HTML/CSS, Wordpress
My Role
I worked together with Leanne Padgett on this project. I developed the initial project concept and we both shared researching. I created the logo, did the task flows, wireframes, prototypes, user testing and created the responsive landing pages. We shared creation of the final skins.
How it works
Intercept utilizes wireless bluetooth technology and an EEG headset with amplifier and stimulator to block seizures. The Intercept app includes a medication alert system, a seizure journal to record relevant data along the with EEG records that are continuously collected by the intercept headset. An additional safety feature includes manual stimulator override in the rare case that blocking current of higher amplitudes is required to interrupt the seizure.
Process
Research
We started by gathering demographic data about Epilepsy.
EEG Devices
Epileptic seizures start in the brain. Typically nerve cells pass signals to each other and if these are disrupted this causes a seizure. While there are already apps out there that assist during a seizure, we found none that helped PREVENT them. This is huge as there is often a 30 minute gap between when brain activity indicating a seizure is present and the time of onset. We found out that the EEG is the most important clinical tool in evaluating patients with suspected seizures. We interviewed a neurophysiologist and went to a lab to look at eeg devices.
Bluetooth
We found a system used in field applications that enabled EEG information to be transmitted wirelessly via Bluetooth technology. This enables the information flow to and from the headset and between the doctor’s portal possible and assured us that our product could actually work for diagnostic data.
Current Procedures
Our research led us to pioneering work with implanted electrodes done by Sridevi V. Sarma, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering. We also discovered the intervention method of Vagal Nerve Stimulation, which uses electrical signals as a preventative measure.
Customer Journey
We developed a customer experience journey that shows the customer engagement with the product and whether their experience was positive, negative or neutral.
Personas
We developed personas based on our demographic research.
Paper Wireframes
We sketched out potential ways the app would interact with the headset and made rough sketches of our wireframes.
Initial Taskflow
This is the primary taskflow outlining the tasks we took our user through.
Initial Wireframes
Prototypes were made from the rough wireframes and tested with users. After integrating the results from our user testing, we refined and iterated. Some of the changes that resulted from our user testing included:
Auto sync feature didn’t need buttons
More specific and intuitive names for menu items were needed
Included a medication reminder alert screen
Added user prompt to enter a detailed seizure journal entry where amplitude was of brainwaves were greater than a certain voltage
Added feature in the event of a seizure the app should send doctor and emergency contacts the users location as well as automatically calling 911.
Branding Guidelines
We developed brand guidelines to assist us in developing our final skins and landing page.
Final Skins
After we finalized our branding guidelines we were able to finalize our skins and make our landing page to market our app.
Doctor Patient Portal
Intercept has several important safety features: the stimulation amplitude is calibrated in your doctor’s office; all data is continuously uploaded to your doctor’s cloud-based intercept database; alerts are sent to your physician, emergency contacts and 911 for any uncontrolled seizures. Patient information is automatically synched to the intercept app for patients ease of use.
Landing Page
The responsive landing page helps to market the headset and mobile app. and also provides social links, as well as links to relevant sources for the latest information about epilepsy treatments.