The problem
Marlo runs eleven physiotherapy clinics. After a knee or shoulder operation its patients go home with a sheet of exercises, and two thirds of them stop within three weeks.
The clinics could not tell who had stopped until the next appointment, a month later.
What we built
- A plan for today only. The app opens on what to do now and how long it takes. The other seven weeks stay out of sight.
- Progress a patient can feel. Each week ends with one sentence, such as how much further the knee bends, measured with the phone.
- A quiet signal to the clinic. A therapist sees who has missed three days and can send a message before the habit breaks.
Nobody keeps doing a thing that never tells them it is working.
How it went
We tested paper prototypes in two clinic waiting rooms before writing any code. The eighteen minute session came from those tests: longer plans were abandoned, shorter ones felt pointless. The app shipped on both stores in week sixteen and went to all eleven clinics in the spring.
