Redesigning a self-catheterization aid to become more intuitive : An investigation done through literature studies and user testing

Abstract: Each year hundreds of thousands of women in Europe need to catheterize themselves instead of urinating the usual way, because of diseases or injuries. However, self-catheterization is hard for a lot of women due to the location of the urethra, and they need some type of aid to help them. The design company MMID in the Netherlands developed a concept with a mirror and a light, which is attached to a toilet seat. Though, it was noticed that it was too hard to handle for the users, hence the authors were asked to improve the user friendliness with the product. Since the intuition aspect was the largest problem they decided to focus on intuition. MMID’s original prototypes were tested by patients and continence nurses to get relevant information that only real users can give, and by mixed women without troubles, to get an insight in the intuition aspect. The nurses and the patients tested the prototypes and were observed, whereupon they took part in a semi-structured interview and a questionnaire, respectively. During the intuition tests the women’s interactions with the prototypes were filmed, and they answered a short questionnaire. The films were then analyzed. The tests showed that the product was very hard to understand and that it gave a feeling of being unstable. This gave the project the focus to make the product easy to open up, without having to assemble it before each use. All important aspects were gathered and several ideation sessions were performed. The results were put together into three concepts and 3D printed prototypes. These models were tested by women interacting with them to see their intuitive actions, which were also filmed. The women also participated in semi-structured interviews. Based on these results a concept choice was made where the simplest solution with one pivoting point was chosen. The concept was further developed and functional prototypes and non-functional prototypes were made. The non-functional models were tested for only intuition among random women, the same way as before. The functional models were tested by patients and nurses at four hospitals in the Netherlands, also these tests were similar to the ones in the first round. The overall results were positive and the product had been significantly improved; a lot thanks to the fact that it did not need to be assembled before it could be used. The biggest negative aspect was that a signifier for opening the product was missing.