Gianluca Camarda | Industrial and Experience design

The Patient Companion has the ability to positively impact a large & diverse user group because it creates a new platform for engagement. The design combines two ubiquitous elements, an overbed table and a touchscreen tablet, to form a single piece of mobile furniture that could be utilized in a wide range of healthcare settings.

In Collaboration with

What's the Story?

The insights revealed that current products often have over-complicated assemblies, that are hard to operate by the patient or staff. Over bed table units should be a patient oriented unit, and not to be used by staff. Technology should be an integral part of the patient experience allowing them to access medical data, communication and some room functions.

Onsite User Research

We were fortunate to collaborate with the Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System in South Carolina. With their knowledge and experience we were able to acquire first hand insights into patient and patient needs.

Ideation

The Concept

Involvement and Challenges

The Patient Companion project was initially started as a university research project. Years later it was formed into the non-for profit organization NXT Health based in NYC. The purpose was to innovate the future of healthcare by improving the patient experience inside a patient room. My responsibilities were directly involved in ID, experience design , user researching, testing and concept proposals. Challenges included limited access to prototyping resources and authorization needed to conduct real patient testing.

2006-2007

University Collaborative Research Project
Research methods include, ethnographic, onsite, observational, interviews, Cognitive.
Industrial design concepts
Experience design exploration.

2012-2014

Industrial and Experience Design Consultant
Concept development,
Over-viewing the prototyping development.