Direct Diagnostics' mission is to enable individuals to carry out precise finger-prick blood tests at home with reassuring guidance. Together, we built an innovative, digitally fueled service that guides users toward the most suitable actions on their unique health journeys.
There's an increasing interest in personalised healthcare globally. The pandemic changed how people see well-being, showing us how important it is to take care of our own health.
Another consequence of the recent healthcare crisis is the realization that hospitals have limited personnel and capacity, and often, it is more efficient to perform health tests at home.
With our client Direct Diagnostics, a startup of Sanquin, the central blood bank of the Netherlands, we developed a brand new digitally fueled service to increase access to blood testing and simultaneously, empower people to take control of their health.
Intending to revolutionise the home blood testing market in the Netherlands, Direct Diagnostics enables people to perform reliable blood tests from the comfort of their homes, which stands in stark contrast to the inconvenient and time-consuming medical procedures in which blood is usually sampled. Its service is backed by Sanquin Health Solutions, who brings knowledge and expertise to the table based on its leading role in blood research.
Our team worked together with the Direct Diagnostics team and pushed for a comprehensive digital approach:
We aimed to craft a platform that goes beyond offering immediate access to individuals' health status. On top of transparently communicating one’s medical data, we have integrated behaviour design elements into our solution, such as gamification and emotional design, to foster the adoption of a healthier lifestyle.
This innovative combination of features empowers users to take charge of their well-being while engaging them in a captivating and personalized experience.
Being Direct Diagnostics' innovation partner, Supercharge played an active role from as early on in the project as the market research phase.
From mapping out strategic directions and potential challenges to analyzing competitive angles and eventually designing and developing the Direct Diagnostics platform, we assisted our partner in many areas throughout our digital innovation journey.
The new digital platform plays a key role in making Direct Diagnostics' home blood testing service a success. It eliminates people's anxieties surrounding performing finger prick tests, which hinders their willingness to engage in proactive health monitoring.
With its digital edge, Direct Diagnostics becomes the trusted friend along the testing journey - it creates an environment where users feel supported, informed, capable and confident about performing a test at home.
To create this safe environment, we heavily relied on emotional design elements to comfort users along the way. Accompanied by a friendly mascot and an encouraging tone of voice, the platform supportively guides people through their entire self-testing experience.
Considering Direct Diagnostics' goal to encourage people to take ownership of their own health, our job wasn’t done with helping them get through the challenging moments of self-testing. The platform also provides users with clear and actionable insights, guiding them towards the most suitable actions to support their unique health journey.
The platform intelligently generates personalised nudges for users based on their individual blood markers, ensuring they receive the necessary guidance to take the next steps:
Whenever their data is not satisfactory, the platform helps to channel them into the right health institutions or prompts them to make an appointment with their healthcare professional.
When there's room for improvement in terms of health metrics, it provides actionable ideas on proactively addressing markers that can indicate future health risks.
It also recognizes and motivates users to maintain their excellent health results, serving as a source of encouragement.
This comprehensive preventive approach sets Direct Diagnostics apart from the competition, making it a truly unique tool for individuals striving to preserve their health.
With the launch of Direct Diagnostics, Sanquin Health Solutions has successfully transformed its vision of becoming more than "just a blood bank" into a tangible reality.
Through the new platform, they are actively enhancing the lives of individuals while opening up new possibilities for utilising anonymous data insights to further improve their assistance in home health testing in the future.
This presents an exciting opportunity for Sanquin and Direct Diagnostics to contribute towards building a healthier society by leveraging the power of digital innovation in healthcare.
Digital tools implemented with careful design thinking and pursuing clear strategic goals can bring your organisation’s competitive edge to the next level in many different domains.
