ROM (Range of Motion) Coach
An app by Precision Movement to help active people get back to and keep doing the things they love by eliminating pain, healing injuries and improving mobility in day to day lives.
PROJECT SCOPE
The CEO of Precision Movement tasked us (a team of three) to design an intuitive and clean iOS application for users who are physically active and want to continue to move around freely and without pain. The app will show them how and teach them what they need to know for injury prevention and movement longevity. In addition, the app will also offer the users to take a fitness assessment and add a personalized exercise routine to their schedules to heal or prevent injury and maintain mobility. We followed the human-centered design approach to make sure that the design decisions were in line with and supported by user research and feedback.
“Range of Motion is defined as both the distance a joint can move and the direction in which it can move.”
Understanding the need.
OPPORTUNITY
It is not easy to find helpful instructions or courses to educate people on how to prevent injury or increase mobility based on their physical condition. There are not a lot of phone apps that let the users create a personalized schedule out of the recommended exercises suggested by the coaches.
01
USER RESEARCH
Getting to know the users.
We reached out to people who already knew about Precision Movement and people whom we considered generally physically active (those who play sports or workout at least once a week).
56
TOTAL SURVEY RESPONSES
EMAILS
FACEBOOK GROUPS
PHONE CALLS
SUBREDDITS
RESEARCH INSIGHTS
With the surveys, we wanted to understand if people are already using any kind of physiotherapy app and their reason behind it. We also wanted to determine the kinds of physical activities the users do and what measures they take in the case of an injury.
Analyzing the data.
The survey results validated the need and interest to build an app to heal/prevent injuries and improve mobility for active people. We used the affinity map to analyze the data that we gathered through the surveys. Also, we found that the existing apps had a lot of restrictions which resulted in them not being used widely.
Youtube is the most popular way for people to learn a new exercise.
Most of the respondents were female.
More than half of the respondents were of in the ager group of 26-35.
A lot of people had no clue about any physiotherapy app
out there.
Most of them use apps for tracking their workouts and progress.
KEY SURVEY INSIGHTS
THE SOLUTION
With our comprehensive research, we were clear on what the users wanted in the app. We came up with an intuitive and simple iOS application that will let users:
Take the mobility assessment to determine their mobility score, movement age, strong and weak points
Create a personalized routine by adding recommended exercises curated by the coaches in the app
Track their progress, see all the past assessment results and measure how far they have come
02
PLANNING
Synthesizing the insights.
We determined two different user personas informed by the key insights, who are likely to use the app and will be guiding us throughout our design phase.
MARKET RESEARCH
Finding the gap in the market.
ROM Coach is not the only mobility app out there. We looked at some direct and indirect competitors of ROM Coach and focused on some key features such as calendar scheduling, video resources, and progress tracking.
The most important feature of this application is to take the mobility assessment and create a personalized schedule based on the recommendations. We wanted to make sure the app is simple and super intuitive, hence the user flow went under a lot of reviews and iterations among the team. However, given the complexity of the app, before creating the user flow, we designed a site map of all the important screens we would need in order to make the navigation easier.
User Flow of ROM Coach
Visualizing the path.
This process was important as it guided us to create a functional flow that outlined what this app would need structurally.
03
DESIGNING
Low-fidelity Wireframing.
After finalizing the user flow, we started sketching out the ideas on paper to lay out the visual structure of the app. After an exchange of reviews and ideas, we finalized the version of the wireframes which we thought incorporated all the important features.
STYLE TILE
Deciding the mood.
For the colors, our client did not want any bright colors, so we decided on blues and oranges. Blue is considered beneficial to the mind and body. Darker blue represents knowledge, power, integrity, and seriousness. Orange combines the energy of red and the happiness of yellow.
These colors also pass the first level of Accessibility criteria.
Mid-fidelity Wireframing.
BRINGING IT TOGETHER
EXERCISES
RESULTS
ASSESSMENT
ONBOARDING
SCHEDULE
We digitized the successful low-fi sketches in Figma, starting from mid-fidelity to start the usability testing with the users.
04
USER TESTING
Validating the design.
To evaluate the usability and intuitiveness of the app, we tested the mid-fidelity prototype with the potential users of ROM Coach, with some success metrics in mind. We tested it with 10 different users. Overall, the tests were successful with exception of the scheduling screens and progress.
BEFORE
The segmentation of the screens was very confusing. The exercise tab had all the added exercises.
The users first added the exercises into their 'plan' and from their they could add those to their calendars.
BEFORE
The instruction here was not visible and users mostly missed it. They were confused about choosing the dates twice.
AFTER
The 'exercise' tab was changed to 'daily' which had the daily check-ins of the exercises.
'My Plan' was changed to 'Schedule' to reduce the number of steps.
AFTER
A toggle was added to make the dates selection more obvious.
High-fidelity design.
After incorporating the user feedback, the mid-fidelity wireframes were polished into high-fidelity wireframes.
Future Considerations & Conclusion.
NEXT STEPS
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Give Vanessa and James the ability to sort the recommended exercises using various filters.
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Add advanced and more detailed assessments to determine the range of motion and healing existing injuries as well.
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Consider designing the assessments for the first time user and the existing user differently.