Date of Award

7-2023

Document Type

Thesis

Department

Computer Science

First Advisor

Rachel Adler

Abstract

The effect of cancer treatment can cause difficulties in a cancer survivor's life due to the risk of attaining a long-term disability which has potential negative cognitive, psychological, physical, and social consequences. Furthermore, post-treatment support has been shown to be severely limited, leaving many to deal with new obstacles and struggles on their own. With no real support system in place, cancer survivors with disabilities can be lost during post-cancer transition. However, mHealth interventions have been proven to effectively aid users in dealing with various health issues. We aim to support and empower cancer survivors through an application called, WeCanManage. WeCanManage supports cancer survivors while navigating everyday life by providing resources such as a platform to interact with other users and modules on ways to deal with the after-effects of cancer treatment. Using Marvel, an online collaborative design platform for creating prototypes, we designed a high-fidelity prototype of WeCanManage. We evaluated it using Nielson’s 10 principles of heuristic evaluation with 22 Human-Computer Interaction university students. We modified the prototype based on the collected feedback. With the polished prototype, we conducted usability testing on 10 cancer survivors. Cancer survivors were given the opportunity to test the prototype and provide feedback to further improve the prototype’s usability, effectiveness, and accessibility for a better user experience. We captured data regarding task completion, satisfaction, and survey data which included their likes and dislikes of the app as well as the System Usability Scale (SUS). Overall, usability testing showed iv positive results for the design of our prototype with only a few design issues found and addressed through modifications.

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