Context

MinuteClinic was shifting from walk-ins to a 100% scheduled appointment model — with the pandemic pushing most patient engagement to mobile overnight. Email and SMS became the primary channels carrying the entire pre- and post-visit experience, but notifications had never been designed as a system: no documentation existed for what was live, how messages were triggered, or where the logic lived in the backend.

• Role: Lead Product Designer

• Team: Product · Engineering · Content Strategist

• Scope: Content Strategy · Service Design · Systems Design

  
  

The Current-State Gaps

• No end-to-end documentation existed for the notifications ecosystem — what fired, when, and from where

• Confirmation codes were easy to lose, with no way to recover them

• Instructions were generic, causing patients to arrive unprepared (missing paperwork, not fasting)

• Missing basics like "add to calendar" created avoidable friction

• The same painpoints were hitting clinicians too — patients unable to check in would knock on exam room doors mid-appointment for help

To fix this, I first mapped the existing ecosystem end-to-end, then aggregated patient and clinician pain points from OpinionLab feedback, our Voice of Customer team, and clinician testimonies — building the first real picture of where the experience was breaking down.

What I Designed

A dynamic notifications framework built around four key moves:

• A documented ecosystem map: The first artifact of its kind — every trigger, channel, and backend source, giving product and engineering a shared reference that didn't exist before

• Dynamic, visit-specific content: Partnered with a content strategist to distill 135+ visit types across three business units into tailored instructions — all routed through clinical and legal review

• SMS → MMS migration: Advocated for and designed the shift to MMS, giving complex visit types room for clear, readable instructions without sacrificing scannability

• A designed set, not isolated messages: Wireframed and iterated on the full notification sequence as one system, so individual emails and texts worked together across the patient journey rather than in isolation

  
  

Outcomes + Reflection

This project reinforced that some of the most impactful design work happens outside of the primary product surfaces. Communication is infrastructure. Well-designed systems can make care feel significantly more coordinated, proactive, and trustworthy.

• Scaled communications across 135+ visit types

• Established a reusable foundation for future communication experiences

• Improved patient preparedness and efficiencies for clinic visits

• Reduced in-person clinician disruptions for check-in related queries