Experience Design
How do you make living life with severe food allergies feel normal?
Oishi is a multi-touchpoint program that supports parents of children with severe food allergies to live happy and healthy lives. By providing a family-friendly preventative solution that seamlessly integrates into families' lives, parents will feel less fear and anxiety. In turn, they'll be able to keep their kids safe while educating them about their allergies at the same time.
Role: design researcher, design strategist, mobile app prototype designer, pitch deck writer & designer
Team: Liz Comperchio, Chuang-Ming Liu, Rebecca Wolfe, Chris Young
The Kickstarter-style video above summarizes the many challenges, frustrations, and fears that parents of children with severe food allergies face on a day-to-day basis, and the solution we came up with to create a better experience for them.
We looked at macro trends in the U.S. and uncovered the magnitude of the problem. For reasons still not clearly understood, the problem of food allergies in children has grown considerably in size over the past two decades. We realized that solving this problem could create considerable impact in the world.
We interviewed people and uncovered key behavioral insights that informed the way we understood the problem to be solved. There are incredible pains that come along with caring for children whose lives are at risk every day. 1) Parents feel stressed about their kids being exposed to potentially fatal allergens, which leads to hyper-controlling behavior. 2) Parents fear dangerous food situations, which leads to their avoidance of social situations. 3) Parents feel like they must protect their kids from allergic reactions 24/7, which overburdens them both mentally and physically.
To help families live more normal lives again, we identified three specific needs to be addressed in a solution.
We laid out design criteria for us to refer to when developing our solution to make sure our ideas would meet customer needs.
To begin solving the problem, we used various tools and techniques to ideate on solution concepts. From creating concept sheets to detailed sketches, our goal was to be as generative as possible to get as many ideas out on the table, often building on each others' ideas. From there, we were able to narrow down on the best concepts to begin prototyping.
The Oishi mobile app supports families by providing customized recipes based on their child’s unique allergy profile. Specific shopping lists are generated, allowing parents to keep meals fresh and exciting for the whole family. Families can also connect with other families in the Oishi community to ask questions and share tips and tricks.
After parents upload their child’s doctor-administered allergy report to the Oishi mobile app to create their child’s allergy profile, a personalized food allergen scanner is mailed to the family. The scanner is programmed with the child’s unique allergy needs and can detect allergens in both packaged and freshly made foods.
Along with the scanner, the Oishi Owl stuffed animal will be mailed to the family. When the scanner detects allergens in food, Oishi Owl speaks to the child, letting him or her know if the food is safe to eat. Through fun and engaging play, Oishi Owl teaches the child about allergies in a positive way.
We introduced the app, plush toy owl and scanner prototypes to users to see their reactions and understand how they might be used in their everyday lives.
