Overview
liVeR
Enhancing liver surgical planning and education at Canada's top hospital by bringing 3D to life.
This was a self-led and funded Master's capstone project where I led collaboration with clients and spearheaded the end-to-end design process. Besides design, I also scripted in Unity to make functional, complete VR applications. In the end, these well-received apps incentivized continued financial support and are poised to augment the workflows of the liver team at the Toronto General.
Role
Product Designer, Unity Developer
Duration
16 months (part-time)
Outcome
2 VR, 1 desktop apps (functional)
Tools
Clients
Advisory Team
Albert Fung (Unity engineer)
Dr. Chaya Shwaartz (product)
Dr. Derek Fung (product)
Dr. Jodie Jenkinson (research)
Dr. Prachi Patel (research)
Project
Self-led, funded Master's capstone
1.
The project produced a multi-user application for internal use.
The flow enables users to easily find, review, and discuss patient-specific anatomy.
2.
We also built twin desktop and VR tools to be rigorously compared in a scientific study.
The applications carefully onboard users to the technology and then allows the user to review patient-specific anatomy.
Research
Tasked with an early vision, I did research, including 4 interviews, to pinpoint core user pain points, enterprise needs, and technical constraints.
Techniques like personas, user journey maps, and affinity diagrams helped me distill the data into project requirements.
Value Proposition
What if surgeons and trainees could halve their anatomy interpretation time for every single patient?
I outlined our project requirements as follows: one multi-user application for internal use, two twin applications for a scientific study, and one video for VR device donning.
Strategizing
In addition to roadmapping and managing the project, my research also significantly informed platform strategy. I highlighted desktop, to cross-functional stakeholders and clients, as an equally viable modality backed by research.
Iterative Design
Each of the 3 apps underwent 1-3 key iterations. I led cross-functional design reviews and usability testing — involving a total of 10 end users and 5 stakeholders — that informed each cycle.
Tests and reviews often included semi-structured exploration as well as task-specific aspects, focusing on particular elements like onboarding flows.
While 2D cross-sections (i.e. CTs) are hard to read, they provide valuable accuracy and detail. To make them simpler, we featured a 3D model, introduced CT color coding, and added indicator planes that correlate 2D and 3D views.
I embedded many GIFs like this one to onboard users to all 3 applications. As compared to text-heavy instructions, usability tests showed they made onboarding seamless.
Impact
"You did such a great job, and you really brought a long-awaited vision to life." "I can see myself using this regularly."
liVeR, a brand new product and one of the first of its kind, was tested by stakeholders, staff surgeons, surgical fellows, residents, and medical students. Recognized for its success and potential, stakeholders secured $75,000 in continued grant funding — a significant feat in a nonprofit context. Demonstrating a seamless, time-saving UX, liVeR is now driving the formation of a new team for formal launch preparation.
Metrics
For the internal tool, I would analyze data like session length, error rates, qualitative user feedback, scene/page exit rates or funnelling statistics to gauge success and identify where the experience can be improved.
Reflections
Thanks to this project, I learned the value of proactively thinking at the level of the organization and its long-term objectives. Also, I learned the importance of clear verbal communication as a skill in design, whether that'd be for the purposes of aligning stakeholders on roadmaps, co-creating with domain experts, or getting team buy-in for research initiatives.
Thank you to the team, clients, and all who made this project possible.