Reaching 10K+ lives with an app that makes healthcare simpler.
Mobile App | Aug 21’- Mar 23’ | UX Designer
Written on 11 March 2025
How We Built Synclo MyMed’s Patient-First App
Context
Synclo MyMed relied on Epic’s MyChart—a platform with limited branding and customization options. Patients found it frustrating, clunky, and disengaging, prompting the need for a dedicated, patient-first app.
My team and I initiated the development of Synclo's own dedicated healthcare app, progressively moving away from Epic’s MyChart system. The goal was to address the limitations of MyChart, which lacked branding customization and provided a sub-optimal patient experience.
Solution
For the MVP, we designed a feature-rich app that blended MyMed’s branding with the power of EPIC’s MyChart system. This allowed us to deliver a personalized experience while maintaining seamless access to patient data.
My role
Led the UX design for the MVP App which included the onboarding, login, Guest experience, Homepage, Provider, and location search
The MVP app launched in the US on Nov 16th, 2022 as Alpha, among 12+ Clinics
Delivering a HIPAA-Compliant solution without disrupting existing users
While the long-term vision for MyMed was to fully transition away from EPIC’s MyChart, our approach for the MVP strategically maintained integration with it to ensure compliance with HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) regulations. We focused on designing non-PHI (Protected Health Information) features such as the homepage, find care, and access to key app features serving primarily as intuitive entry points. When users accessed features involving PHI, such as viewing medical records or appointment scheduling, they were seamlessly redirected to MyChart’s native workflows. This approach allowed us to deliver a familiar and branded interface while maintaining HIPAA compliance and minimizing disruption for existing users.
Note: Some designs shown in this case study may differ from the final launched product. This is because the case study focuses on work done during the MVP design phase, meaning certain features may have been added or removed in the current app
Designing for the U.S. from India
Being based in India, we had limited firsthand experience with the US healthcare system and its processes and relied heavily on the US team’s insights and verbal feedback.
Due to the legal and compliance requirements with EPIC, there were many aspects of the functioning of mychart app including visuals and screen recordings the team in India wasn’t privy to. Thus, we purely relied on word of mouth and flow charts drafted by our counterparts in the US who had access.
Understanding the landscape
Since access to EPIC’s full system was limited, I improvised—scouring Google, watching YouTube demos, and asking the US team pointed questions to fill in the gaps. This approach helped us map out essential features and interactions without direct access
Understanding our users: What they told us
To understand patient pain points with my chart app, we conducted 15 in-depth interviews and surveyed 150 Minnesotans. The feedback was clear:
“Unless you are trying to schedule like the most routine and mundane types of appointments that it's just easier to call and schedule stuff”
-Participant 3
She (My mother) struggles to understand the doctor’s profile descriptions listed online and finds them unclear
-Participant 6
"Sometimes I can't find things that I'm looking for"
Participant 7
From these insights and understanding the background of our end users, We created 3 user personas, however, for the MVP App we considered 1 of the 3 as our primary persona
A tech-savvy professional who wants to easily track and share health data with his care team and receive personalized care.
A 41-year-old mother of two, including an autistic son, Moira recently moved to Minnesota and is looking for specialized care for her eldest and a pediatrician for her youngest. She also needs to find primary care providers for herself and her husband.
She needed to:
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Efficiently find trustworthy providers
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Seamless appointment scheduling for her whole family.
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Stay organized with health reminders, especially for children's specific needs
A Hmong immigrant who needs language support, help understanding the healthcare system, and financial assistance. He needs an interpreter to fill out forms and translate test results.
We focused on Moira, a busy mom managing her family’s health
By designing for Moira, we ensured the app was not only easy to navigate but also reduced the cognitive load on users managing multiple profiles.
Getting patients started without the hassle
The login experience needed to be simple and secure. Since patients would use their MyChart credentials at this stage of the app, there would be no registration flow.
"Sometimes I can't find things that I'm looking for"
Participant 7
Homepage:
Prioritizing what matters most to patients
Through feature analytics, we were able to identify the most used feature and validated those assumptions during interviews, informing us to populate tier 1 features in the first fold of the homepage.
I created a rough IA for the homepage, post which I conducted a white boarding session with the team and the Journey Owner from the client side to collectively decide and agree on feature grouping and prioritization
"I would like all three of our charts in the same account and I don't have to like create special accounts for them or something...that I just show at the top my name, my daughter's name, my son's name and I can click and see all of our stuff”
Managing multiple profiles
Knowing Moira is a primary caregiver for her children, we wanted to make it easy for her to manage her family's healthcare needs. To simplify this process, we enabled Moira to seamlessly switch between her profile and her children's profiles from the homepage
The profile-switching feature allows Moira to easily toggle between her own profile and her children's, ensuring she can schedule appointments, view test results, and manage prescriptions without logging in and out of multiple accounts
Parents or legal guardians have the right to access their minor children’s medical records
Once children turn 18, the system may restrict her access per HIPAA and Minnesota state laws
The ability to customize names and manage record-sharing settings is only available within the user’s own profile
At each step, I checked the technical feasibility of my concepts by collaborating with the tech team reducing friction and iterations at later stages.
Helping patients connect with the right providers faster
Designed a self service workflow where users can identify the provider and location that best fits their needs. For MHF, it promotes revenue generating services by creating an entry point for scheduling appointment for guests and authenticated users
Rather than giving users the freedom to switch tabs or edit location mid-search, we decided to restrict those actions once the results were generated to avoid confusion and accidental taps that may lead to API errors.
Provider location switch: In IOS, segmented controls. In Android, Toggle tabs
Incase the location access has been denied for the app, the default location will be set to ‘Minneapolis’
Quick links reducing the number of taps to arrive at relevant results
IOS Native designs
Android native designs
Learnings and Challenges
Designing for two OSs at once
90% of Minnesotans use iOS, but we also designed for Android simultaneously. This meant mastering both Apple’s HIG and Google’s Material Design principles and making sure our app felt native on both platforms.
POV docs saved the day
