Care2Prevent
Group project at General Assembly for non-profit adolescent HIV clinic.
About Care2Prevent
Care2Prevent is a pediatric and adolescent HIV program in South Side Chicago and fills a critical HIV prevention and care need. Wrap-around services, outreach, prevention education, and testing are free of charge. Those who test positive are brought in for clinical care, case management, and behavioral help.
My role: Research, strategy, client liaison, content editing, and site redesign after initial design phase. Project revisited and redesigned in March/April 2023.
The Problem (client perspective)
"The main challenge during COVID is reaching people. Our population is notoriously hard to engage with, and the pandemic has made it even harder. We've run a few ad campaigns on hookup sites – the results have been disappointing. It's also hard to follow up on people who have clicked through our website. How can we more effectively engage with our target population to get them the help they need?"
Research: Initial Steps
We began the Care2Prevent project by researching their core services and how their website represented them.
The website focused on C2P's primary mission–testing local, vulnerable youth for HIV and connecting them with medical services. Their wrap-around services–counseling, case management, and support groups–are hugely important to their staff and clients. Our remit was to help them with their outreach to these youth.
Outreach methods that failed dismally included advertising on hookup sites like Grindr and bus ads.
Care2Prevent's most successful outreach method was its presence in drop-in centers. At-risk youth would stop by these centers to get various services: meals, sanitary products, computers, and internet access. It was also a place where they could find information on jobs and housing.
Interviews
After the initial meeting, we interviewed case management, outreach, and mental health staff.
The staff expressed conflicting concerns–one member thought digitizing client case records would streamline their process. According to the director, a database was already in place, but not everyone used it. The one thing they all agreed on: their clients need their immediate needs addressed first. This population suffered from poverty, trauma, and isolation. HIV testing and treatment were only part of the equation.
The clients were all unified in their gratitude for Care2Prevent. They didn't always answer our questions–it seemed they weren't relevant to their lives. Getting tested for HIV was low on the priority list when housing was a huge issue. Coming to Care2Prevent was the first step away from isolation and into a community that accepted and cared for them.
Here is a synopsis of our findings:
Multidisciplinary: wrap-around service: ambulatory, behavioral health outreach, prevention, and case management.
Technology: is always an issue. Phones are on and off.
Rapid intervention: service model: immediate needs 1st.
Advocate: Make someone who is doing exceptionally well in the program an advocate.
Trauma: Demographic has had a lot of trauma and doesn't trust easily. They notice or are told that they aren't like the others.
Support Groups: The Rose Petals support group is doing well, and they would like to add two others: one for caregivers and the other for youth living with HIV.
Staff
Clients
Demographic: 20-31 years old, African American, Chicago residents. Two are parents.
Trust: Trusting relationships with staff, mentors, and peers have been built over time – it didn't happen right away.
Gratitude: They are grateful to Care2Prevent staff for personalized care and for really listening to them.
Immediate Needs: Housing is a big issue for many. Help with applications, letter writing, etc., is always mentioned.
Inclusion: They feel isolated. Being in groups makes them feel included while teaching them new things.
What people are saying
“Care can mean being a listening ear to patients who haven’t felt safe in disclosing their medical status for fear of rejection, scrutiny or shame.”
— Elaine Seaton, Medical Case Manager
"Some people work to get a check, and some people love to help people and see them doing better."
— Z, client, early 20’s
"You know, when I'm down, like when I feel like I can't do anything, he pushes me forward."
—A, client, early 20s
“I don’t know what Meera’s title is, but she’s been like everything... She’s been my therapist, she’s been my counselor and she’s been my case manager. I really appreciate the whole team.”
— K, client, age 31
Persona
After concluding our interviews, we created the persona "Chris."
Problem statement:
Chris needs a safe space with staff he can trust so that he can access the resources and healthcare he needs without fear of being judged for his sexual preferences and life choices by his community.
How Might We…
After reviewing our interview sessions and coming up with a problem statement, the group came up with three “How Might We” statements. These statements were used as the basis for our ideation sessions.
How might we make Chris feel safe enough to ask for the help he needs?
How might we overcome the stigma that might prevent Chris from coming into a sexual health testing center?
How might we reach more people like Chris so they can benefit from supportive services?
Ideation Session
After defining the problem, we held and ideation session. Participants included two educators with experience working with at-risk youth, one social worker, and a North-Side Chicago LGBTQ community member.
Based on the responses, we chose the most prominent themes to focus on for UX features.
We broke down their responses into the following main categories:
Sex Education
Community Resources
Private Communication
Positive Messaging
Peer Support
Incentives
Features
Our ideation session reinforced our assumptions regarding new features for the site.
In addition to working on new features, I conducted an UX audit to identify problem areas to address in a redesign.
Private Message Functionality
Would allow people to reach out to Care2Prevent anonymously to ask personal/private questions.
Video Testimonials and Information Section
Care2Prevent has a record of clients thriving and leading productive lives after coming to their clinic for wraparound services who want to tell their stories and give back to the community. Care2Prevent already has a YouTube page, but it needs more accessibility. By creating pages with people sharing their stories and gathering relevant information, potential clients can learn more about how Care2Prevent can help them.
Information Architecture Audit
Investigating how users navigate the site and how easy is it to find the information they need
Restructuring of the navigation of the current site to help users with their options in terms of getting help
Resources pages restructured
The events page needs more clarity.
User Journey
Here's a map of our persona, Chris's emotional journey.
UX Audit
I audited Care2Prevent's existing website to identify functional issues and improve user experience.
Here are the key takeaways:
Site Map Navigation
Global navigation categories were not intuitive
Events calendar & YouTube videos
Needs more accessibility, events page needs more clairity
UX writing overall and Community Resources page
Great information is buried in text heavy paragraphs. Users typically read 20% of the content because they’re scanning for information
Best practices for writing for the web
Use short words, short sentences, short paragraphs, and active verbs.
Bulleted lists are easier to scan
Further Iteration
Our project focused on research, developing new features, and doing a UX audit-areas from where we felt the organization would benefit most. After we finished, I embraced the agile methodology and updated the design incorporating their current identity and the new features.
Style Guide & Mood Board
For the mood board, I did a deep dive into royalty-free images. My goal was to have something fresh and current.
Design
I changed the font used in the prototype from Montserrat to Metropolis. Metropolis has the same feel but has a narrower width.
I standardized the site’s color way and added complementary ones to make the design more cohesive and pop more.
Features
After doing an unofficial review of the site with educators serving this demographic, I changed “testimonial videos” to “videos” in the menu and added “patient stories” to the dropdown.
I removed the “Empower” pop-up.
I added some multi-racial images to make the site feel more inclusive.
Results: UX Audit, MVPs, and Redesign
In March and April of 2023, I revisited the project.
Site Map Navigation
C2P removed redundant pages and content resulting in less clicks to get desired results.
Events Calendar
Their events calendar was hard to access and had multiple pages. I initially redesigned the calendar to be one page with popups for more information. Care2Prevent went one step further and reduced the events calendar to a list on one page, making the content much easier to access. In my most recent redesign, I added links to their google maps locations.
Private Messaging Utilizing AI
Our primary MVP was a private messaging function. C2P's client base doesn't trust easily, and the thinking was that if there were a way to get information anonymously, that would encourage them to reach out. However, when I reviewed C2P's current site, they made the messaging function/chatbot feature more visible but chose not to use the contact scrambling feature.
In revising the chatbot, I emphasized C2P's promise that all communications and patient information are confidential and never shared without their permission.
I also enhanced the chatbot to embrace AI technology to understand simple sentences so it could direct the user to the appropriate resource.
Writing for Web
C2P is now following the "bite, snack, meal" method of writing for the web and reduced the amount of text to better communicate with its users.
Video Pages
Care2Prevent liked having testimonials and bringing content from its YouTube page to its website but hasn’t done so yet.
Site Map
After the audit, we revised the site map with the help of a card sort.
Mood Board
Our last mood board focused on Care2Prevent’s role as an HIV health clinic – but in our interviews, time and again, it was that their wrap-around services were a lifeline for their patients. In this version, I focused on hope, freedom from isolation, and inclusivity.
Style Guide & Design System
In March and April of 2023, I redesigned the site and created a new design system to facilitate handoff to developers.
High Fidelity Prototype
Research/Design/Strategy: Jane Huntington, Anooja Chitnis, Kevin Nguyen, and Ron Shiri
Tools Used: Figma, Maze, Invision, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Lottie Files, Illustrator, and Adobe Color