This week’s reading:

“Reframing Health to Embrace Design of Our Own Well-being”, with Hugh Dubberly, Shelley Evenson, and Paul Pangaro, Interactions, ACM, New York, May-June 2010

My Reaction:

The emerging trends in self-management and the recent changes in design practice illustrate how people are now expecting to interact with the services they encounter. It is more and more likely that we are not looking to buy ready-made solutions to our problems and might even have reservations about it, questioning the intentions and motivations behind the provider. The health care providers are no different, especially when clients can collect their own data, begin to understand their own behaviors and come to the HCP with knowledge that is unique to them. I think empowering people with this kind of knowledge helps shift the levels of power as mentioned in the article.

One phrase that was really powerful for me was: “We won’t be able to ignore how we’re doing; we’ll always know.” Video games are a good example of always knowing how we’re doing. We have a score, we have goals, maps, and other tools (depending on the game) that give us constant feedback on how we’re doing and therefore give us the tools to make informed decisions and risks. If we always knew how we were doing in terms of our health, we would have the data to make informed decisions towards our health goals. I don’t think that simply knowing means that we can’t ignore it, but combining knowledge with a goal, can be very powerful.