Epocrates - foundational research
Epocrates is one of the most popular medical reference apps for doctors in the US. At its high point, roughly half of all US doctors used Epocrates. In recent years, the app began to gradually lose active users. As part of an effort to revitalise the app, athenahealth (Epocrates' parent company) created a new team to focus on refreshing its core features.
The UX Designers and Product Owners on the new team did not know enough about Epocrates users, their workflows or the context in which they use the app.
Objectives
Build substantially more empathy for Epocrates users
Understand how the app fits into the context of doctors' workflows
Identify potential new use cases
Uncover new questions to guide future work
Methods
Contextual Inquiry
Affinity Mapping
Application of social science theories during synthesis
My role
Lead a 5-person research team
Co-created a research plan
Trained colleagues to do the research
Facilitated synthesis activities
Recruited participants and coordinated site visit logistics
01
Planning, Recruitment & Training
With a colleague, I produced a detailed plan for the project, including materials to assist our team along the way: a site visit guide, a sheet for capturing and coding observations, and an outline for multiple data synthesis steps.
I contacted over 500 doctors (many of them current users) in the San Francisco Bay Area. I didn’t get much response until I sent a follow-up email offering lunch for their offices. The response rate immediately jumped from 1% to 5% (never underestimate the power of free pizza). After screening, we scheduled half-day visits with 8 physicians with different specialisations.
02
Contextual inquiry
We chose an ethnographic-style approach, with in-person observation and semi-structured interviews. The team focused on aspects such as patient encounters, staff interactions, workflows, physical space, technology and reference tools. This approach provided team members with maximum exposure to physicians’ daily work in a very short time period. In addition to helping us understand the context in which physicians operate, first-hand observation yielded many true stories that we could tell to boost empathy among our developers and internal stakeholders.
03
Affinity mapping
We printed over 850 observations and quotes onto Post-It notes and spent half a day on a giant affinity exercise. There were no predetermined rules for grouping the data points - we looked at the data through various relationships and themes (ex. workflows, things that frustrate clinical staff in the same way, etc.) Once we had groups of eight Post-Its or less, we labelled each group with short, user-centric statements.
04
Applying theoretical perspectives
A colleague proposed that we look at the data through the lens of some established anthropological theories. As he put it, “anthropological theory is HUGELY useful in doing synthesis of research informed by ethnography.” We hoped that this would help us generate robust insights and identify future opportunities.
Each of us read up on a specific theory, and slept on it. The next morning, we reexamined our group labels and applied those theories to write a series of “meta-statements.” Some of them were interesting, and others sounded far-fetched. We reviewed them against the raw data and our personal recollections to decide which statements rang true.
Results
Understanding & context
Designers and product owners quickly acquired a wealth of knowledge and insight about the daily lives of doctors, and the role of technology tools in their practices. The team was more prepared to design new features and solutions, and to help colleagues empathize with the Epocrates user base.
Research experience
Everyone who participated in the research trip gained valuable experience in conducting qualitative research, including observing and interviewing users in the field and translating observations into actionable insights.