Designing the Children’s Wisconsin Mobile App

Introduction

Challenge:
Children’s Wisconsin, a nationally ranked pediatric hospital, was dissatisfied with their out-of-the-box Epic MyChart app, feeling it lacked branding, cohesion, and an integrated digital experience.

Solution:
We partnered with their team to design a custom, EHR-integrated mobile app that provided a branded, one-stop-shop for healthcare needs — streamlining access to symptom checking, virtual visits, appointment scheduling, and more, while deepening patient and family loyalty to the Children's Wisconsin brand.

Goals

  • Build a branded mobile app fully integrated with the existing MyChart experience.

  • Enhance patient and family loyalty by offering additional helpful tools beyond the portal.

  • Enable streamlined access to urgent care, symptom checking, messaging, and video visits.

  • Create a simple, intuitive healthcare experience for busy parents.

  • Maintain high adoption rates while boosting usage of expanded digital services.

Research

Discovery Methods:

  • Built on top of extensive internal research conducted by Children's Wisconsin (focus groups, user testing, prototype analysis).

  • Analyzed user engagement patterns with the existing mobile app (high patient portal use).

  • Identified behavioral preferences through family-focused research.

Key Insights:

  • Families desired a simple, consolidated digital healthcare experience.

  • Parents preferred quick, text-based communication options over calls where possible.

  • Families wanted to feel connected to their pediatricians, with seamless ways to reach them digitally.

  • A successful app needed to funnel users naturally toward tools like symptom checking and urgent care to maintain in-app engagement.

Design

Solution Details:

  • Designed a streamlined mobile app building on CW’s high-fidelity prototypes and flows, focused on access, communication, and ease of use.

  • Core features included:

    • Ability to call, text, or schedule appointments easily with clinics.

    • Symptom checking tools to direct families to the right level of care.

    • Urgent care reservations at CW locations.

    • Video visits with pediatricians for virtual convenience.

  • Ensured the experience was intuitive for both logged-in MyChart users and unauthenticated users, promoting flexibility.

Development Highlights

  • Full MyChart integration for seamless access to patient records.

  • Custom scheduling system that syncs directly with Epic.

  • Virtual visit solution using Zoom integration.

  • AppCatalyst widget integration, offering symptom checker, dosage tables, and first aid advice.

  • Customizable home screen, allowing users to prioritize key features (e.g., pediatrician favorites, appointment access).

  • Built a personalized user experience that adapted based on login status and usage patterns.

Challenges

  • Maintaining Familiarity While Innovating:
    We had to retain the functionality users trusted (MyChart) while expanding the experience with new tools and keeping it feeling simple.

  • Balancing Logged-In and Guest Users:
    Designing a flexible system that worked for both authenticated and unauthenticated users without duplicating complexity.

  • Streamlining Complex Healthcare Actions:
    Ensuring that scheduling, messaging, symptom checking, and video visits were simple, fast, and mobile-optimized, avoiding overwhelming parents.

Outcomes

  • 5-star average app rating post-launch.

  • Significant positive feedback from parents emphasizing:

    • Ease of scheduling.

    • Fast bill pay.

    • Direct text and appointment access to pediatricians.

  • Increased engagement across urgent care reservations, symptom checking, and virtual visit tools.

  • Unified brand experience that keeps families engaged within the CW ecosystem, instead of bouncing out to external systems.

What I Learned

This project reinforced the importance of designing for moments of stress — especially for parents navigating children's health concerns. Simplicity, personalization, and fast access to action were the true drivers of success, not just offering more features. Additionally, it showed how blending trusted legacy systems (like MyChart) with modern UX expectations can create a bridge between familiarity and innovation, delivering experiences that users quickly adopt and champion.