ITnCare
Increasing COVID-19 testing for low-income communities through local pharmacies
Role: Design & business strategist
MIT Hackathon March 2020
Team: avantika pathak, jenny zhu, Jahnavi Jambholkar, Shen ning, Hannah Snell, Samantha Leff
Main methods I used:
+ User Journey map
+ UX/UI design & iteration
+ Business Model Design
+ Design Research
+ Market Analysis
+ Ecosystem map
After the initial research phase, our team saw a tremendous opportunity to leverage local pharmacies as a trust-based system to incentivize COVID testing for low-income neighborhoods. Pharmacists play a vital role in delivering convenient access to important public health services and information. The accessibility and distribution of retail and independent community-based pharmacies make pharmacists the first point of contact with a healthcare professional for many Americans.
Our solution is ITnCARE, a digital platform that outsources pharmacy needs for high-throughput community testing.
Market Analysis
Market size & top competitors/co-inhabitors
Our team found that our solution would sit in the digital health market, specifically in the digital pharmacy market, overlapping with COVID-19 testing, the anticipated COVID vaccine and current vaccine market.
What sets us apart from the competitors is that we are not a marketplace or simply a network map, but a connector between patients and pharmacies, which has not existed before for COVID-19 testing.
We consulted with a group of pharmacists from University of Southern California School of Pharmacy to design a business model for the platform.
We wanted to address the cost-prohibitive challenge for local pharmacies through a tiered pricing subscription model, while also charging established pharmacies a percentage of revenue from sourcing patients via ITnCARE portal.
The Prototype
Quick web browser prototype
We quickly prototyped the pharmacy interface for both browser and mobile app.
The browser will allow local pharmacies to register and set up a database through the ITnCARE portal. They will automatically get matched with patients based on location and testing availability.
Quick mobile app prototype of data summary page
The mobile app has the same functions, in addition to data analysis of test availability, allocation based on risk priority, and patient database management.
With more advanced tech development, we hope to pioneer the first digital all-network communication channel between pharmacies and health care providers.