The Problem
Asthma is a common condition affecting 9% of all children in the US and these children are substantially more likely to suffer from anxiety. They currently have support networks of parents, teachers, doctors, and peers; yet there is still room for improvement in education and interaction. How can we better support children with asthma (ages 8-14) as they mature and become independent?
Fresh Air
FreshAir is a mentoring program that connects children with asthma to college mentors with the same condition. Mentoring is known to have strong positive effects on youths’ personal and academic ability. By having mentors who really understand what it’s like to live with asthma, they can provide that extra level of emotional support and confidence that children need.
Service Blueprint
Our simplified service blueprint shows how mentors, mentees, and parents would use FreshAir.
Digital Touchpoints
The FreshAir website allows mentors and mentees to apply online. Once matched, they can view each other’s profiles and start planning a meet up.
The Mentor page, visible to families
The Mentee page, visible to matched Mentors
The app provides a secure way for mentors and parents to communicate, plan hangouts, and journal about their experience.
“I wish I had something like this when my daughter was growing up. It would’ve really helped both of us.”
“The concept of connecting kids with asthma is phenomenal.”
“When I was at my lowest point, meeting my mentor turned my life around. I became a mentor so I could do the same for someone else.”
Process Overview
Role
Interaction,
Service Design
Client
Philips
Duration
2 Months
Team Members
Denise Nguyen
Manya Krishnaswamy
Mika Nomura
We partnered with Philips to design a service that could improve the lives of children with asthma and their families.
To learn more about how we got landed on FreshAir, check out the process section below.
Research
Online Research
Interviews
Design
Storyboards
Service Blueprint
Prototyping Touchpoints
Research
Online Research
We started with broad secondary research about asthma, how people manage it, and existing products and services. Of the many problems that we found, we picked the three most interesting topics for us as a team.
Snapshot of the findings from our initial research. We wanted to focus on the middle three.
Interviews
Then we spoke with stakeholders who were impacted by asthma, educators, and medical experts to understand their experience with asthma.
Interview Insights
- Everyone tends to be overly cautious around children with asthma, parents and teachers included
- There’s a knowledge gap for children and parents learning to live with asthma
- Mentorship and support are powerful tools for confidence
- Young children look up to older children. Parents and teachers use this to their advantage when convincing children
- Physical activity improves asthma, but kids don’t get enough of it
Design
Storyboards
We created many storyboard scenarios to test what kinds of activities children would enjoy with mentors and how to make parents comfortable with letting them go.
Service Blueprint
We mapped out every interaction between parents, children, and mentors for our service concept. We used this as a conversation starter with parents and potential mentors to see if the process made sense.
Full Service Blueprint - Click here to view the full size PDF
Value Flow Diagram between all the stakeholders
Prototyping Touchpoints
We prototyped two points of interaction. The first is the initial interaction with FreshAir, the website where everyone signs up and gets matched. We tested to see what information was relevant to parents and mentors and how much they were comfortable with sharing.
The second touchpoint is our mobile app where everyone communicates. The app also suggests things to do and lets you write about your hangouts, two features that parents and kids were excited about.
Special thanks to my team for being awesome
From left to right, me, Denise, Mika, Manya