Hepa

Three questions to the project team

What was the particular challenge of the project from a UX point of view?
The biggest UX challenge was designing for a chronic condition, where the emotional weight of the disease is just as real as the clinical complexity. Users weren't just overwhelmed by fragmented tools, they felt alone in a system not built for them. Balancing medical accuracy with emotional clarity was a constant tension. I had to make sure the app felt like a companion, not a clinical dashboard, so every screen had to carry both trust and warmth, without oversimplifying something as serious as liver health.

What was your personal highlight in the development process? Was there an aha!-moment, was there a low point?
The aha moment came during a user interview with my family member, who has Chronic Hepatitis B. After walking him through the concept, he looked at me and asked: "Are you in design school or medical school?" That was the moment I knew the design was working, this project belonged in both worlds. The low point was early on, feeling lost between systems thinking and product design. Learning to map the full Chronic Hepatitis B feedback loop before touching any screen was what unlocked everything.

Where do you see yourself and the project in the next five years?
In five years, I see Hepa evolving from a speculative concept into a real product, with an actual smart tracker on the med bottle, HBV viral load data, and a trained AI companion for HBV patients. For myself, I want to keep working at the intersection of systems thinking and human-centered design, tackling complex health or social challenges where design can genuinely reduce burden. Hepa showed me that the best design makes hard things feel less burdensome, and that's the standard I want to keep building to.