Design a healthcare application that would be useful for handling COVID-19.

Assumption: 

A healthcare tech firm wants to create an application to support people affected by Covid-19.

Goal: 

User acquisition and then immediate engagement (as the need is now)

User personas: 

There are 2 groups of people majorly affected by the health hazard - healthcare workers and the common public. Let’s consider the needs of both these groups before prioritizing the user group.

Healthcare workers:

• They have the maximum exposure to virus hence they need ways to safeguard themselves from catching the virus including PPE equipment
• They are over-worked and mostly stay at the hospital. They need a way to relax and spend some time with their family without putting them at risk
• They want to help multiple patients at the same time to save as many people as possible
• They constantly need additional resources to keep them going in their work
• They need a way to connect with fellow healthcare workers within or outside their workplace to get suggestions in real-time

Common Public:

• They want every new update regarding the virus immediately
• They want to know whom to contact in case they need any kind of medical guidance
• They want to find ways to lead a normal life

User Persona Prioritisation

I can’t say whose problem is bigger between the 2 sets of people as everybody has a reason to suffer during these tough times but as a healthcare tech firm, I have decided to create an app to reduce pressure on the healthcare workers.

Needs Prioritisation

Among the needs that I have listed down, I believe the biggest requirement is to connect with internal and external hospitals or healthcare providers to discuss extra resources such as PPE equipment or guidance on some special cases. This way the healthcare workers can have an impact beyond the boundaries of their workplace.

Solution

So, I will create a forum to connect all the healthcare workers on a single platform to discuss Covid-19 issues. Requirements of the forum will be:

1. To ask and answer questions based on:
   1. Health specialty
   2. Resources requirement
   3. Common health topics during COVID such as symptoms or medicines
2. Direct messaging to specific healthcare provider contact
3. Search for existing solutions
4. A way to block questions unrelated to COVID

It’ll be like Quora but only for Covid-19 topics and only for healthcare workers around the world.

Features

Features of the forum:

1. Profile page for all the healthcare workers where they must upload their healthcare ID. A profile will not be enabled without the ID
2. A page to create questions
3. Comments box below each question
4. A direct message button on each profile for people to directly ask questions without creating a publicly visible question
5. A search capability to search for healthcare workers’ names, COVID symptoms, Healthcare specialty such as cardio, pulmonary, etc.
6. A text analysis feature which will automatically block questions unrelated to COVID and answers unrelated to the question
7. A tagging feature to explain the urgency of the issue

Metrics & Risks

The metrics I will use to track the success of this app are:

• Acquisition:
  • # healthcare workers signed up
• Engagement
  • # questions created
  • # answers created
  • # direct messages sent
  • # searches done
• Performance/Risks
  • Time taken to perform a search
  • Time taken between question creation and answers
  • # tags used vs. # questions created
  • # questions/answers marked as COVID-non-related and hence blocked
  • # of non-healthcare workers who signed up