Find a Dentist
Software Used: Figma, Adobe Illustrator & Photoshop
Role: UX/UI Design & Research
Overview
In partnership with Diversify by Design Intensives and Delta Dental, the School of Design at San Francisco State conducted a 5-week culminating project as part of SF State’s User Experience Design course. The project aimed to redesign the Provider Search experience to better meet the needs of patients.
Problem
$770,000
Did not find what they were looking for
*Approximately on PCP Changes
Did not use the refine search tool
The existing Provider Search experience had limited ability to match users with the right dentist, resulting in high call center usage. Only 20% of users used the Refine Search filtering tool, while 80% did not.
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“The limited use of this feature creates a gap between the current patient experience and an experience that fully meets patient needs.”
Research
The UX research provided by Delta Dental indicated that the inability to find a dentist on their site compromises trust. To help users successfully find a dentist, build that trust, and reduce call center costs, we asked how might we make the search process more proactive and search refinement more discoverable and flexible for users.
Comparative Analysis
We conducted a comparative analysis to see the features and interactions that other provider or service search tools use to identify interaction and filter patterns that could improve Delta Dental’s experience by:
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Mapping search results based on level of detail and hierarchy.
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Evaluating other provider search tools based on heuristics, interaction patterns, and content.
The chart at the bottom right includes a few of the attributes we looked at such as discoverability, user freedom and control, and their map interactions.
Hueristic Evaluation
We conducted a heuristic evaluation where we compared the current Find a Dentist tool against usability best practices and brainstormed recomendations to increase the tool’s usability. Some of the recommendations from this evaluation that we built out include:
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A proactive advanced search.
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A more discoverable filter location with quick filter options.
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Increased visibility and flexibility of applied filters on the search results page through filter tags.
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Clearly articulated attributes on product cards
Approach
User Goals & Tasks
Initial search: Patients need to search for dentists based on individual needs.
Refine search: Patients need to quickly identify and adjust their filter settings.
Select provider: Patients need to see more information about the dentists that populate in search results.
Information Architecture
Design
User Flow
Our early concepts focused on bringing search refinement to the beginning of the flow, implementing filter tags, and updating taxonomy so the user could find the best dentist for them earlier in the search.
Our user task flow is based on the three tasks that make up the provider search tool. Here we propose multiple entries into the search results giving the option to refine search earlier in the flow.
Sketches
Prototype
Guided Search
We emphasized the use if a guided search entry wizard that helps users refine their search at first “Find a Dentist” touchpoint.
Advanced Search
We provided options for advanced users to manually apply filter selections at the initial search entry.
Search Filter
Increased filter discoverability and flexibility lead to increased filter use and targeted provider searches.