Medical Web Site

Tenuta reviewed the usability of a web service that provides information for doctors that is not easily available elsewhere. The project had demonstrated their web solution to doctors and incorporated some feedback. The project was visited by Tenuta shortly before a planned validation in several countries by 500 users.

The usability review suggested that it is unlikely that any experienced web user who makes the effort to familiarise themselves with the site will encounter any major problems. However, doctors are often busy and impatient, and may not devote the effort to become familiar with the site, and are unlikely to spend much time reading documentation. Users who have initial problems are unlikely to return. So the site should be as easy as possible for first time users.

In addition, the acceptability and usefulness of the site for doctors may depend on minor issues that can only be identified when doctors try using the site, so Tenuta strongly recommended initial in depth pilot testing with a few selected doctors.

The project had also prepared a very complex validation questionnaire. Tenuta recommended that it should be limited to about 10-15 simple questions, as additional questions or a complex questionnaire would significantly reduce the response rate.

Following the visit, Tenuta contacted a doctor by telephone, explained what the site was for, and asked them how they might use it. The doctor was invited to try carrying out their own tasks, and to explain their experiences over the phone. The doctor encountered problems with the complexity of the interface, interpreting the results, and incomplete information in the underlying database, and as a result said that they would be unwilling to use the system. If these findings were replicated with other users, it would suggest that validation trials using the existing version of the web site would produce a very poor response.

This highlights the risk of just relying on demonstrating a solution. The way the web site works may make sense to the audience at the time, but nevertheless leave them mystified if they sit down and try to use it unaided.

Final Reports

The following reports of the findings and recommendations from the usability and accessibility audits of the Medical Web Site may be of interest:

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