THE PROBLEM
We found that many people who suffer from migraines & headaches could benefit from preventative treatment.
THE GOAL
Create an app that helps migraine sufferers get alerts for upcoming weather and pressure changes so they can take preventative messages.
THE TIMELINE - May 17, 2023 - June 3, 2024
MY ROLE
My main role in the group was user research, wireframing, interaction design and prototyping. My teammates concentrated on content writing and user testing.
OUR TOOLS
Figma
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator
USER PERSONA
We created a persona that we felt combined all of the big concerns and feelings we found during out interviews. Mandy was our main focus through the next phases of our study.
1 in 7 people suffer from migraines globally (American Migraine Foundation) and more than 1/3rd of migraine sufferers say that weather patterns can trigger their headaches.
We found that Mandy is not alone, according to our research
That’s a lot of people with no personalized way to track or manage this phenomenon.
A National Headache Foundation survey found that 3 out of every 4 people in the survey said that weather triggered their headache pain
USER INSIGHT
We found that headache and migraine sufferers could benefit from ways to monitor not only pressure but temperature and humidity as well.
They often experience other symptoms along with their headache and their mental health is often impacted. They could benefit from uplifting messages and positivity in their day.
Many sufferers are able to prevent the majority of their symptoms if they catch their headache in the early stages, so they could benefit from a warning when they might have a flare-up so they can prepare
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
We performed an audit of competing websites and apps to better understand the market and gain actionable insights.
We used a survey screener to define our user base and to find users that we could interview. It also let us gain insight into what they truly needed and what key features they wanted. We conducted interviews with 6 known chronic headache or migraine sufferers
RESEARCH PLAN
IDEATE
STORYBOARD
We created a storyboard that illustrates how using our app could help Mandy during a typical day in her life..
RESEARCH
After considering all of Mandys needs, we settled on 4 critical features -
1. The app must track barometric pressure changes in real time so Mandy can see changes as they happen.
2. Mandy must have the ability to log attacks so the app can determine patterns in pressure changes that cause the headache attacks.
3. Because she is often so happy when an attack ends that she forgets to track it, we want Mandy to have the ability to see previous pressure changes and retroactively log the attack.
4. To help prevent migraines before they start, Mandy wants to be notified of upcoming pressure so she can take preventative measures.
FEATURE PRIORITIZING
EARLY INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
USER FLOWS
IDEATE
WIREFRAME & TEST
FIRST ROUND WIREFRAMES
In our early lo fi screens, we added information we thought would be most pertinent to the success of the app. This included the home page and user reports, but users found the data visuals in the first iteration confusing and unhelpful.
While the majority of the tasks could be completed by users, we found that the first task caused difficulty.
Task: Can you tell us what pressure change has the potential to give you a headache based on the apps data?
Fix: Gave a more prominent location to the users Pressure Threshold while also creating coach marks for users who are unfamiliar with what a pressure threshold is.
FIRST ROUND USABILITY TESTING
After our first initial testing, we continued to make iterations to our wireframes. We stated what a user's pressure threshold was on the home screen, and added an information icon for users who may be confused by this metric.
We then removed the graph from the reports page, as users found it unnecessary and would rather it be nested inside the Pressure Threshold widget.
Updated graphs were added to the homepage to show more concrete measurements of pressure instead of abstracted graphics. This allowed users to focus on one element of visual data instead of multiple graphics.
ITERATIONS AFTER TESTING
The first task had a success rate of 50% out of 5 users tested.
Before moving into a higher fidelity prototyping, we ran another round of tests with our new wireframes.
In this round of testing, we tweaked one or two tasks to fit with our new prototype, but kept the same essential ideas at the heart of all our tasks.
And with this new prototype we found that our task completion went up…35%!
PROTOTYPING
STYLE & PROTOTYPE
HIGH FIDELITY PROTOTYPE
As we moved into high-fidelity screens, we addressed the issues that arose from our second round of testing.
We created an additional page. If the user had previously logged an ongoing headache, they would be taken to a screen with the details of their in-progress headache. Users were then given the option to edit or end the attack. If the user did not have an open attack, they would be taken through the normal process of adding a headache to their log.
To help users understand “Pressure Threshold”, we added a coach mark to the home screen. This ensured that no matter where in the app they were, the user could find a definition for our key feature.
BRANDING & STYLE GUIDE
We wanted Mandy to feel uplifted and empowered by our app, both in our wording, her interactions with the app, and our chosen style.
We landed on a soft, pastel color pallet to convey a sense of peace and an airy, almost sunset-like look.
Many of the users we interviewed told us that they experience light sensitivity while having an attack, so we chose to keep the background dark to make it easy for them to engage with while having a migraine.
Using elements from our style guide, we iterated until we felt our app would provide a delightful experience to users like Mandy.
CLICKABLE PROTOTYPE
REFLECTION
Looking forward, we can see opportunities to improve Aura, providing even more features for users like Mandy.
We would love to add humidity and allergen metrics to the app, as research shows these can affect headaches for many users.
We also wanted to bring more joy to users by adding uplifting messaging when they first open the app for the day or celebration messages for extended periods when they were headache-free.
Adding cross-platform options such as smartwatch apps gives Mandy and our users even more ways to stay informed. As well as a larger likelihood of seeing app alerts and preventing migraines before they start
