Product Design · Healthcare
StatChat
A HIPAA-compliant OR communication platform that replaces pagers and hallway handoffs with a patient-centered feed -- giving surgical teams a shared, accountable, timestamped view of every patient from arrival through recovery.
The Challenge
Surgical teams relied on overhead paging, dry-erase boards, and hallway handoffs to coordinate patient care -- with no accountability and no record that anyone had received or acted on a message. When a patient moved from pre-op to the OR, the people who needed to know often didn't. The cost of that gap wasn't inconvenience -- it was patient safety.
Research & Contextual Inquiry
Contextual inquiry with OR nurses, surgeons, and anesthesiologists revealed a deeply fragmented communication workflow -- patient data split across Sisweb, Central Scheduling, and Epic, with no shared language between roles. HIPAA compliance was non-negotiable, and accountability had to be structurally enforced through a defined 'Last Man Standing' rule requiring at least one provider available at all times. Most critically, the platform needed a legally defensible audit trail distinguishing between Delivered, Read, Acknowledged, and Acted Upon.
Information Architecture & Interaction Design
Designed the communication model around a patient-centered feed with a three-tier urgency system -- Low (silent wall post), Medium (active push), High (immediate sound alert). A 90-110 character limit kept exchanges precise and scannable. Role-based interaction patterns tailored for Pre-Op nurses, Anesthesia, and Surgery gave staff accurate, trackable message templates they could send in seconds. Thirteen OR trigger states -- from 'In Facility' through 'Procedural Care Complete' -- gave the entire care team a shared, timestamped language for the surgical day.
User Flow - Physician Perspective
Outcome
A HIPAA-compliant mobile platform with a clear information hierarchy and role-filtered views -- replacing pager chaos with a structured, accountable communication layer that gives every surgical team member a real-time picture of every patient from arrival through recovery. Built on a communication model that's both clinically usable and legally defensible.
Key Screen Wireframes