Frida Åberg

Assignment 3 – Design Toolkit
Materials & Service Design

(test version)

Assignment 1 – Material
                                  
During assignment one we were supposed to explore the quality and the possibilities of four different fabrics. As a starting point I did a lot experiment with the material. One of the most interesting things I found was the meeting between the flexible textile and a solid object, how the fabric was taking care of /captures the object.

 

I kept exploring with the flexibility of the stretch fabric I found that if you combine a no stretch fabric with a smaller piece stretch fabric you can control the flexibility. I will keep working with the fabric and try to apply it to human centered products, maybe in the health care industry.

 

Assignment 2 –Commercial

For assignment two I chose to focus on patient experience. I used the design method “The Futures Wheel” and tried to map out historic, current and future aspects of patient experiences.

 

The most interesting part I found out from the method was “Smart textiles” connected to future patient clothing.

I believe that “Smart textiles” is a field whit a lot of potential for future developments. For example there is existing projects that made fabric illuminate, react on pressure or water.  I wanted to look in to how technology could be used connected to health care industry in a future scenario were the patient experience is a keystone.

            What if…?

• The patient clothing could collect important data?
• Important data could be wireless connected to the hospital equipment?
• The patient didn’t needed to stay at the hospital,  -Could the patients’ health be observed from home?
• The clothes could give the patient/doctor a warning call if some medical values went bad?

 

First layer:

The first layer is a thin shirt with slim fit, made of a super elastic and breathable material with sensors that can collect different kind of data, like EKG, temperature and blood pressure. The data is wireless connected to the hospital’s medical equipment. 

Second Layer:

Second layer is an updated version of today’s patient garment. Comfortable clothes with regular fit, inspired of shapes and functionality from sportswear. Patient can preferable use their own clothes to avoid institutionalizing.

 

 This concept is based on the idea to afford a new, more flexible hospital treatment with focus on the patient experience. With this wireless solution the patient doesn’t need to stay in bed connected to hospital equipment, they might even be able to stay at home and the doctor can still keep track of different kind of medical data.

I think that the biggest value for the patient in this concept would be improved comfort, freedom and hopefully a better total experience.  If the patient can be treated from home together with online treatment it would benefit the hospital economical and give room for next patient. For the producer this concept is much more than just a matter of patient garments, this is a paradigm shift and a possibility to create a new market.

·         Differentiation

·         New focus groups

·         Human Centered Design

·         Invention Driven Development