Varian BRAVOS Afterloader

How might we streamline Varian's BRAVOS brachytherapy treatment delivery workflow to minimize the time treaters spend navigating the software to reduce overall treatment time for patients?

Our MHCID capstone project partner was Varian, a medical technology company specializing in cancer treatment delivery. In this project, we streamlined the software used for administering radiation to patients.

Duration: March 2023 - September 2023

Role: Project Lead, UX Designer

Double Diamond Design Process

  • Discover

    I conducted research with my team to determine areas of opportunity and improvement, such as the need for clear workflow indicators.

  • Define

    My team and I narrowed down our priorities to making information larger and easier to find, as well as being able to track progress.

  • Develop

    I designed one step of the treatment workflow, starting from Crazy 8's ideation to creating high fidelity mockups in Figma.

  • Deliver

    My group and I conducted usability tests and made adjustments to the high fidelity designs based on user feedback for our final version.

Discover

  • Heuristic Evaluation

    We identified usability issues and design inconsistencies with the existing BRAVOS software to identify areas of opportunity. (Image is blurred for privacy)

    A look at what the original software looks like, slightly blurred for privacy.

  • Competitive Analysis

    We assessed the current effectiveness of the Bravos software UI and its value proposition compared to its competitors, and proposed strategies to make it more intuitive.

    Images of six different companies that we analyzed for areas of improvement and opportunity

  • User Interviews

    We conducted interviews with radiation therapists to learn about their job and how they interact with radiation technology and software in their day to day lives to identify further areas of opportunity.

    A cartoon image of a woman conducting interviews over video call

Define

We conducted affinity mapping, created user personas, and a user journey map to craft a problem statement that encompassed user needs:

How might we streamline Varian's BRAVOS brachytherapy treatment delivery workflow to minimize the time treaters spend navigating the software to reduce overall treatment time for patients?

A user journey map detailing the path a radiation therapist takes when administering radiation to a patient

Develop

  • Low Fidelity

    I built a simple framework for what I wanted my screens to look like on a functional level. I focused on button placement and table placement.

    A low fidelity digital wireframe of an early draft in our design, in white and grey colors

  • Mid Fidelity

    I refined my ideas based on partner feedback as we finalized button placements, color, and important elements.

    An in progress version of the layout that integrates button emphasis and a more developed framework

  • High Fidelity

    We finalized colors and I added visual emphasis on highlighted rows and buttons to make sure the most important information stood out.

    The high fidelity version we finalized that uses color strategically for emphasis

User Testing and Feedback

We tested our design with users, who found our design to be intuitive and easy to use. They did find some items hard to read, so we tried to make sure text was larger where needed and important elements stood out.

From our partner, we discovered they wanted us to follow their branding more, so we changed the color scheme to a Varian themed color scheme.

Final Prototype

We were able to streamline the BRAVOS user experience by making information easier to find and read on the screen. We also made it clear in the navigation where the user is located. We were also able to take our partner’s business needs into account by using their colors and branding to make it distinctly Varian.

  • Key Takeaways

    Learning how to balance user needs and business needs was an important takeaway from this project. My group and I had to learn about and create a redesign of existing software that would better serve user needs, and we successfully took on the challenge with this project.

  • Next Steps

    I would conduct further user testing to refine the design further. We were told that we could explore different design choices, so further learning of the subject matter to determine essential elements would also be key in this.

Next

UCI MHCID