CAITLIN L MULDOON

'New' Does Not Mean 'Inexperienced'

A career change can be daunting, scary and exciting all at the same time, however it is important to remember that a career change does not mean completely starting over again.

 

Having the self awareness and motivation to undertake a career change is something that should be admired. Individuals who transition from another career bring with them a wealth of experience and knowledge that can be both unique and invaluable when coming into their new role.

 

Having worked in healthcare as a physiotherapist for 8 years I have summated endless experiences and faced countless challenging situations. Healthcare, especially within a hospital, is extremely multifaceted being both rewarding and frustrating at the same time. We see patients and families often at their most vulnerable and need to work jointly with a large multidisciplinary team to achieve the best outcome for the patient, whilst also appreciating the needs of the organisation.

 

UX in Action

During my physiotherapy career I have been responsible for reviewing and improving clinical services to better the patient experience, improve patient flow and increase hospital revenue.

 

One such clinic encompassed children with breathing pattern disorders, which was taken over from a previous clinician. This clinic had a long waitlist due to staffing changes and encompassed a diverse patient demographic. The waiting list was triaged and the clinic commenced running based off the recommendations from the previous clinician. However, it quickly become evident that the clinic was not running as efficiently as desired and this appeared to mainly be due to inappropriate/incomplete referrals and a high non-attendance rate.

 

When discussing the issues with both the multidisciplinary team and the patients, a number of themes became obvious. Mainly the referring clinicians were not aware of the specific referral requirements for the clinic and patients and families were unsure what the appointment was for or why they had been referred.

 

From these discussions a meeting was held with the medical team to review referral criteria and a new referral form and triage system were created. A leaflet was also created explaining the role of the clinic which was to be provided to the patient on referral. The appointment letter sent to patients hoped to be improved to more clearly reflect the type of appointment, however when discussed with the hospital's IT department it was advised this was not possible with the current system but would continue to be problem solved jointly.

 

These simple changes improved the clinic flow significantly however some problems still persisted.

 

Having now studied and transitioned careers to UX design, I have a better understanding of some of the downfalls of the above process and have reflected on improvements that could have been made.

 

By taking the time to conduct more research with the patients and the medical team (the stakeholders) a deeper understanding could have been gathered on the pain points with the clinic and provided increased buy in from the senior hospital management. More in-depth research into similar clinics could have also been completed to provide better insight into current practices. Increased patient involvement could have occurred to gather more insights from the end users to improve the overall clinic experience.

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The Main Focus of Healthcare is the Patients - The Users

All aspects of physiotherapy are influenced by UX with key overlapping areas being service improvement and research. The aim is to understand each patient’s individual needs and develop a treatment plan that addresses these, often the presenting problem is not the true problem and there are factors that need to be accounted for. I enjoy working with people and better understanding their problems and jointly coming up with solutions to overcome these. Within healthcare there are also endless time constrains, resource limitations and restricted finances which influence the way in which problems are solved. This makes healthcare workers extremely adaptable and empathetic.

 

I am excited to continue to bring my unique wealth of experience to my new career as a UX designer.