A Wearable At-Home Health Monitor

Philosophy: People First

A Wearable At-Home Health Monitor | Proteus Digital Health | 2011-2013

The Need: Broad Adoption

Our goal was a BluetoothTM connected, fully disposable wearable designed for broad adoption. Our early monitor (built before I joined) required a Ph.D. to turn on and looked like a piece of lab equipment.

The Design: A User-Centric Mental Model

I pushed the team to define a user-centric mental model. The device has one button and one LED, and we shifted from overloading the button with multiple functions to presenting only one function from the user’s perspective: talk to my phone now. This allowed users to quickly learn and then remember how to use the device.

We next focused on industrial design to evoke a personal consumer device. When research suggested discomfort with disposing electronics, we shifted to a two-piece model with reusable electronics. We aimed for comfort, minimizing the hard footprint and using a soft adhesive cloth for the rest. A packaging study explored how the product could fit seamlessly into the home while optimizing production and distribution.

My Role: Head of Department

I articulated our interaction strategy and attended frequent reviews to ensure implementation maintained the vision. I identified external industrial design and user research resources and closely managed all design execution.

Early wearable created by the engineering team

Final appearance model of the new wearable

Packaging study optimizing for both integration into the home and manufacturing needs

Open packaging