We were tasked with finding a problem area that affected a large number of people, greatly. Our job was to find a problem area and framing it.
Team members
Gregory Metcalfe
Rebecca Sader
Rithika Mirnalini Rameshkumar
My role
I curated research along with another team member, created the final presentation, part of the script, and presenting.
We all wrote down what we brought to the table, and what role we tended to fall into and enjoy the most in groups. We wanted to highlight everybody's skills, and make the most out of each member. We included our goals for the project, what we wanted to get out of it, and expectations for the group. All ideation and decisions were done as a team.
Medical care is a right, and everyone should have access to it. However, when you live in a country like Canada with 5 people and a million kilometers wide, it can be hard to reach everyone.
In just a few weeks with a team of four, we decided to tackle access to medical care for rural and indigenous Canadians. We didn’t come up with a solution to this massive problem, but we developed insights that we can take into our future work, and share with others.
We were working with an industry partner, which added pressure to the situation. We wanted to represent Sheridan and our group in the best possible way. We also wanted to stand out as individuals, and showcase our skills.
We had a limited time frame of just a few weeks, and one of our teammates was in India, so we had to navigate meeting times between time zones.
We all chose different problem areas we wanted to focus on, and wrote down opportunities in those spaces. After generating the ideas, we plotted them on a decision-making matrix to decide which one affected the most people, in the most significant way.
We landed on healthcare, and together researched the biggest problems in the industry, and landed on issues facing rural and indigenous Canadians.
We were aware when approaching this topic that we would be working to solve a problem for indigenous people in remote areas of Canada. None of us in the group are a part of an indigenous group nor do we live in a remote area. If we were to pursue this topic, we knew that we would have to have these communities be a part of the solution because there may be something significant we missed.
We also would ensure we conducted rigorous testing at all phases with people of all physical and neuro diversities to make sure the app is accessible to everyone.
People living in rural areas have less access to medical care, and face more barriers trying to reach it, whether it is physical, like transportation, or social, like the stigma around mental health.
Indigenous Canadians are often stuck in remote areas due to colonization, face discrimination by medical professionals, and also have to consider environmental factors like lack of access to clean drinking water.
Mortality from preventable causes are at a rate of 242.3% vs accessible areas at 122.5%
Only 16% of family physicians and 2% of specialists
Doctors are not able to communicate with their colleagues due to their location, and are often isolated in their practice which can lead to harmful behaviors
Education and communication are not adequate
Shame around mental health and addiction treatments
Lack of transportation
Women
Women tend to be the primary caretakers for the elderly and young members of their families
Aged 18-35
Young people tend to adopt new technology more readily
Indigenous people
Indigenous people and people of color are often overlooked, ignored, or not believed in their medical care
Reach 144 municipalities, 106 First Nations and over 150 unincorporated communities
26% of Ontarians live in rural areas or small population centers
32% of Indigenous people in Ontario live in rural areas
mHealth applications rose 65% since 2020 globally, Was USD 24.93 billion in 2020, Market exhibited a growth of 65.7% in 2020, Estimated to register USD 38.89 billion in 2021 and USD 314.60 billion by 2028
In our research, we found a few different web apps that were attempting to solve our problem. We found that there were several features not included in these that we thought to be important.
Offers OHIP and NIHB coverage
Easy to use and understand UI/UX
24/7 access
Geared towards general health
Allow rural doctors to consult with their peers
Based on these, we found that the best option would be an online system that connects doctors and patients in remote areas to doctors and specialists in more densely populated areas.
I was in charge of creating the final proposal presentation. I took all of our research and ideation and compiled it into a document. My group then went through it and added or changed things around. The other presenter Greg and myself divided the slides and wrote a script that added to the content on screen.
Then we recorded and presented to our peers and RTI!
In the end, I’m proud of what we made. My team worked really well together, and we all put in a lot of effort to make sure we made something worth sharing. We didn’t solve the problem, but I wasn’t expecting us to. We learnt a lot about a topic that is important and feels overlooked. We can take what we learned and use it going forward, where one day we might be able to make an impact.
Also our topic got chosen as one of the topics for the next semester, which is the cherry on top ;)
emilybetts342@gmail.com