Open Admissions
Redesigning an outdated, inefficient interface into an intuitive workflow hub. Helped users reduce task time by 30% & earned an industry leading NPS score of 35.
Company
Role
Year
DaVita
Design Lead
2022
The Challenge: An Outdated Interface Hindering Patient Care
The Open Admissions Smartapp (OAS) was originally built with a focus on back-end data feeds, leaving the user interface outdated & disconnected from real-world workflows.
The primary user, Integrated Kidney Care Assistants (IKCAs)—who support Registered Nurses (RNs) in patient outreach—relied on this tool to manage admissions. The system's limitations made their work harder, not easier.
Outdated Interface
Users couldn't sort patients by admission type, making it difficult to organize their workload.
Workflow Inefficiency
The system did't surface high-priority patients, forcing users to "hunt" through records to identify who needed attention first.
Time Constraints
Completing simple daily tasks required a multi-step process, often preventing users from finishing work on time.
In one particularly telling research interview, an RN shared:
"If you have a good IKCA, then you will be a great nurse. If you don't it's almost like making work harder on yourself."
This insightful quote from a thoughtful user underscored the real world impact of the problem—when IKCAs struggled to keep up, it directly affected patient care.
Existing Open Admissions App
Building Trust & Laying the Foundation
When I joined the project with a new team at DaVita, my first priority was to build trust with a product team that had never worked with a designer before.
I scheduled 1:1 meetings with product leaders and key stakeholders to understand project goals, key workflows, and future needs. these conversations not only surfaced critical user challenges but also established design as a collaborative partner in problem-solving.
This trust building approach ensured that design work would drive both immediate improvements & long term innovation.
Conducting the Audit: Identifying Key Opportunities
With a shared understanding in place, I conducted a comprehensive UX Audit of the existing OAS interface. This revealed several opportunities to streamline the user experience:
Navigational patient populations: surface patient groupings by admission type to support prioritized workflows
Clearer critical path: standardize call to action buttons to guide users toward task completion
Simplified filtering: reduce filter complexity while introducing a reset option & "Overdue" toggle
In-Context actions: enable users to complete their most common & critical tasks—like updating patient status—without leaving the interface
Throughout the audit process, I facilitated regular check-ins with my product counterparts, ensuring continuous alignment & momentum.
Audit Results
Mapping the User Workflow: Designing for Daily Success
Understanding user workflows was critical to designing an effective solution. Through collaborative work sessions with product & research, I discovered the top priorities to design for:
Making contact with a patient
Logging a status update on the patient's health
However, the existing system forced users to jump between multiple screens and manually track progress. By centering the design around this workflow, I aimed to consolidate critical information & actions into a single, intuitive interface.
Workflow Map
Open Admissions Smartapp 2.0: A Streamlined, Intuitive Experience
The redesigned OAS maintained familiar structural elements to reduce the learning curve while introducing impactful improvements.
Patient Population Navigation
Previously buried within tables, admission types are now primary navigation elements, allowing IKCAs to prioritize their outreach.
Focused Filtering
Simplified filter options—including an "Overdue" toggle & reset button—streamlined the interface.
Split CTA Button
The split button enables users to update the activity log without leaving the page. It supports secondary actions.
Solution Quickview
Results
The redesigned Open Admissions Smartapp was launched in 2024 to a very positive reception amongst our user base.
35
NPS Score (industry standard is 0)
"My day starts off so much more organized. I love that my front page pops up and has my TOC calls and new admits already sorted for me. The search options let me breakdown my morning workflow in a way that works best for me, so there is no chaos."
"I love the addition of the Admit tab - I feel more organized each morning which makes my calls go smoother and quicker. The Activity Log button has been a huge timesaver when tracking my existing TOCs."