Vaccinex

The COVID-19 pandemic. We know the story...

The pandemic meant that no travel was risk-free anymore. Many countries implemented measures like social distancing and travel restrictions, and many companies adopted the work-from-home policy.

With time, vaccines were created and distributed worldwide to help combat the spread of the “virus”.

In Nigeria, the NCDC (National Center for Disease Control) together with the Ministry of Health accredited a number of health centers across the country where people could go for their COVID-19 vaccination.

I led the product design on this project. My first task was to fully understand what the process of locating vaccination centers was like. This included researching announcements made by the health agencies to understand the official directives, as well as speaking with people to figure out the reality of the experience.

Through this exercise, I was able to identify a potential risk of people visiting unaccredited health centers to get vaccinated.

My discoveries impacted my design decisions in terms of information architecture and user journey.

The product manager and other stakeholders had initially conducted one-on-one interviews with people to identify their concerns about the process, and their experiences both before and after the vaccination.

Based on the user feedback, we were able to summarize the key user problems related to the procedure for locating vaccination centers and scheduling appointments in Nigeria.

Unvaccinated persons are skeptical due to rumors of fake vaccination centers injecting saline, cunning unsuspecting citizens.

After vaccination, patients are given a proof of vaccination certificate on paper. Easy to lose/forget.

The next step after identifying the key user problems was to come up with viable solutions within the constraints we had. We were able to identify useful APIs that would help speed up our development as we were looking to ship the product very quickly.

We followed this up by mapping out the flow for the product after which I began work on the designs.

The account creation of the product is quite straightforward. However, because we’re showing them center results based on location, we require them to turn on their locations on signup. We also verify phone numbers because conversations between the user and vaccination center contact will be done through phone calls.

Users can see their vaccination status as well as the country-specific and global COVID-19 statistics in real-time.

The bottom navigation is simplified to help the users easily find what’s most important to them; Home, Vaccination Centres, Certificates, and a Chat section.

Users can search for vaccination centers with the option to filter by proximity, ratings, and open times. The user interface has an augmented reality view as a visual aid for locating the center. Users can also call and message center contact to schedule appointments.

During the user interviews, we noticed that many vaccinated users struggled with the mode of certification. They were handed a paper card that was easy to misplace or get destroyed. They also had to carry this card on them wherever they went which wasn’t the best experience.

As a solution, we designed the app to enable centers to issue digital versions of the certificates with a scannable QR code. Users can now easily access it anytime from their mobile phones.

Looking back, this was my first attempt at designing for the healthcare industry, and I learned a ton of new things while working with Vaccinex; from the users, my teammates, and the product itself.

I’m quite proud of the work I did.