This project focussed on the use of smart textiles for full body posture monitoring and exploring the potential of a tight fitting catsuit to measure posture close to the body. A full body monitoring system (FBMS) that is wearable and easy to use, was found to be most relevant in the domain of first line care physical therapy(PT). As the form of the product was set in the beginning of the project, the ViP analysis was used to gain insight in the Domain of physical therapy, the context the FBMS is used, the qualities of the interactions users have with the FBMS and the features of the product. A fully textile based wearable system for monitoring postures is complex but not impossible. In terms of research in the field of wearable textiles, recent developments has shown a surge in possibilities and posture sensing abilities. The identified target users are female physical therapy patients with a young family who experience lower back pain. Prevalence of lower back issues are highest among musculoskeletal conditions and issues related to lower back pain have a large influence on the rest of the body. Here the posture changes due to poor posture behaviour, creating deformities in the body. These deformities can be measured by adapting strain resistive sensors to textile based sensors and integrated them in a tight fitting bodysuit. For this purpose, the zigzag stitch, shieldex 2-ply silvercoated yarn and 85% lycra proved most successful in obtaining a useful sensor signal. Here, posture and change in posture could be measured and provide the user with direct haptic feedback on their posture with vibration motors.

Millennials, a generation of individuals born between 1981 and 1996 that are shaping the current working class. One trait that makes millennials stand out from other generations is that their generation is the most stressed out. It is estimated that 20% of employed millennials in the Netherlands are suffering from symptoms due to stress. These symptoms include less life satisfaction, tiredness, and, most importantly, insomnia. The fact that stress causes insomnia makes stress a relevant problem for Somnox, as its mission is to help 100 million people sleep better by 2030. Somnox is a Dutch scale-up that focuses on developing companion-like innovations that improve human wellbeing through the power of breathing. The fast-growing company is on the look-out for new ideas to expand its product portfolio. One of these ideas is a portable breathing regulation device. The assignment’s initial brief was to turn this rough idea of a portable breathing device into an advanced concept design. I approached this by adopting an iterative approach in which I quickly ideated, built prototypes, and validated these with users. This approach has led to the final concept: the Somnox Mini. The Somnox Mini is a portable breathing regulation device that simulates breathing motion using robotics. By following the device’s breathing frequency, the device guides the user in slow breathing - which is a breathing exercise in which the breathing frequency is reduced to 6 breaths per minute. Research shows that breathing at this particular frequency induces a biological phenomenon called respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), which synchronizes the heart rate variability (HRV) and breathing frequency. This stimulates the body’s relaxation response. Long-term practice of slow breathing has been proven to balance overactive stress response and improve insomnia symptoms.

The project focused on improving Olympic foiling classes sailing athletes' safety: Nacra 17, iQFOiL, and IKA Formula Kite. The primary objective was to investigate dangerous circumstances with foil sailors to research the mechanisms that cause injuries and develop a design solution to prevent them. The research performed provides an integrated perspective into the subject of foil sailing safety. The research methods include participatory observational research, one-to-one interviews, multimedia evidence analysis, incident reporting archives study, and explorative retail analysis. Current wetsuits fail to protect sailors from foil strikes, as they only cover limited areas of the body. Four primary objectives are established. Impact and cut protection on the entirety of the wetsuit's surface, comfort, and aesthetics, which are two factors in attracting the use of such a suit. The product's name is Websuit 1, which is a protective wetsuit designed for Olympic foiling sailors. Full-length woven Dyneema lining is stacked with lightweight neoprene and GRDXKN foam— a mix of comfort and unprecedented protection. Results of several iterations have proven that GRDXKN can be printed on Guard Shield. Furthermore, based on the tests, 100% Dyneema lining can be bound to neoprene rubber thanks to lining glues. The proposed wetsuit manufacturing method is the same as the current one, with the addition of a GRDXKN screen printing and heating phase. Under the impact tower, the GRDXKN absorbed 56% of the maximum force applied from a 10J impact. The developed reinforced neoprene has been shown to distribute the energy over a larger surface, which decreases the stress applied to the body. Furthermore, the reinforced neoprene did not tear or break under stresses caused by 50J impacts. In contrast, conventional neoprene concentrated the applied force on a smaller area for the same energy impact and was torn. This project provided the first steps into connecting innovative textile technologies with the sailing world.

A new healthcare domain is growing which is called eHealth. eHealth solutions are getting deployed in order to tackle the ongoing problem of an increase in patients with a chronic disease in The Netherlands. Medicine Men has developed a eHealth solution for patients with chronic diseases which is called the Emma Activity Coach. This application runs on a Fitbit smartwatch and is part of the Emma system which consists out of a smartphone application called Emma.6 and a desktop application called Emma dashboard. The aim of the Emma Activity Coach and the Emma system is to empower patients with a chronic disease in monitoring their activity in their own environment with the support of an informal caregiver and a healthcare professional in order to improve the quality of life of the patient. Project focus The focus of this project is on exploring the target group of the Emma Activity Coach and its needs in order to improve the Emma system. The user interaction and experience of the user are explored. Problems that come up are translated into design iterations which result in a proposed final design that fulfils the found needs and the set design vison. The ecosystem of the project consist out of three parties: • The patient • The informal caregiver • The healthcare professional Target group Literature research and interviews with several healthcare professionals showed that the use of the Emma Activity Coach would be beneficial for patients with chronic diseases such as COPD, Type 2 diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease (CVD). The target group is characterised by comorbidity; I.e. suffers from more than one chronic disease. This means that there is an overlap of disease symptoms of which activity, and therefore the use of the Emma Activity Coach is found to be beneficial. Target group challenge and needs The target group is explored via several patient interviews who suffer from COPD and/or Type 2 diabetes, three informal caregivers and three healthcare professionals. The main challenge for the target group is knowing their activity limits in order to gain back trust in their physical and mental condition. The target group has problems with getting enough activity or sometimes getting too much activity, which is often the case for patients with COPD. Their disease makes it hard for them to recognize their limits due to constant being short of breath. The challenge of the target group is translated into four needs; the need for autonomy, security, stimulation and support. Several design criteria are setup according to these needs and translated in the concluding design vision; to make the patient feel in control of their physical and mental health condition, by providing clear feedback on their activity. Design process Several user studies with COPD patients who had experience with the use of the Emma Activity Coach on a Fitbit smartwatch were performed. Interviews, observations and user tests revealed multiple design and comprehensibility problems with the current design of the Emma Activity Coach. These problems were tackled via three iteration rounds with the target group participants. The Emma dashboard of the healthcare professional, with the focus on physiotherapists, is also explored by interviewing 4 physiotherapists who have made use or still use the Emma dashboard in combination with the Emma Activity Coach. The iteration is presented as a starting point for further development. The evaluation with the target group shows that the proposed design of the Emma Activity Coach achieves the set design vision of this project.

This project aims to develop tailored non-invasive ventilation (NIV) masks for children in the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU), to offer suitable masks and to improve the NIV intervention. In the PICU, there is a preference for NIV compared to invasive ventilation, because of complications, such as airway injuries. Their biggest challenge is finding a suitable non-vented NIV mask. They often do not fit well, resulting in too much air leakage and patient-ventilator asynchrony. This increases the breathing effort of the patient, and can lead to NIV failure. The air leakage is often too high, therefore the mask has to be repositioned and tightened to reduce the air leakage. This disturbs the patient and influences the patient’s comfort.

The core problem of NIV is the excess of unintentional air leakage. Therefore the main focus lies on reducing air leakage by increasing the fit of the new developed NIV mask. The new masks need to fit patients up till the age of seven, because the available masks do often not fit well. There are no non-vented NIV masks available for patients below one year. An oronasal mask is developed, it is most effective and relatively non-intrusive compared to the other types of non-vented NIV mask. NIV at the PICU can be divided into acute NIV, for which an acute NIV mask will be developed, and extended NIV, for which an ideal NIV mask will be developed.

Four concept NIV masks are developed, of which two concepts are selected based on the results of the simulation and most important requirements. The NIV intervention is simulated by ventilating a reanimation mannequin with prototypes of the concepts to determine the effectiveness in terms of air leakage and contact pressure. The two selected concepts shows reduced air leakage compared to commercially available masks.

The final design proposal consists of two masks: the Modular Mask, and the Quick Curable Mask. The Quick Curable Mask is developed for patients who require acute NIV. The Modular Mask is developed for patients who need NIV for an extended time. Due to overcrowding at the PICU of Amsterdam UMC there was a shortage of NIV tubes and sensors, it was not responsible to test the masks. Therefore a protocol is written to test the air leakage and evaluate the wearing comfort of the two proposed masks with a test participant after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The final design proposal is suitable for NIV at the PICU. A roadmap describes how the two mask can be further developed by the hospital and implemented in the PICU. It consists of the following phases: the optimising phase, the clinical testing phase, the implementing phase, and the redesigning phase.

This thesis project investigated how user-centred design(UCD) contributes to the railway maintenance planning optimisation. A new UX concept and digital prototype were designed to provide intuitive interaction and clear structure to support the planners confidently and independently optimise railway maintenance planning on a digital platform.

This project is under the context of the Dutch railway infrastructure maintenance. With increasing demands for transport on the Dutch railway, optimising maintenance planning for existing infrastructure is challenging for the Dutch railway network management organisation ProRail. Thus, a data-analytic software ProRail Maintenance(PRM) for railway maintenance planning optimisation was developed for the maintenance planners at ProRail. However, as an analytic tool, the outcomes and functions came first for the company while the user experience(UX) was neglected at first, which leads to a series of usability problems and requires much learning time from the users.

Based on the above situation, two initial research questions were proposed: “What are the causes of these usability problems?” “Will UCD help to improve the UX of PRM and How?” A series of UCD methods were used in the whole process to understand users’ needs, generate and iterate concept and the final design was evaluated by the final evaluation test.

The initial goal in the research phase was to understand the context, problems of PRM and causes and users. Literature research was conducted combined with interviews with experts to understand the Dutch railway maintenance planning. By analysing the qualitative and quantitative data collected from interviews and user testing of PRM, a list of problem statements, design goal and requirements were defined. In the design phase, a series of design activities with users(e.g co-creation session, prototype tests) were conducted to generate ideas and iterate the concept by prototype tests with users. By involving users in every stage of the process, I got instant feedback and had a deeper understanding of the users’ needs and quickly verify the hypothesis and iterate concept.

The final concept called Macomi Maintenance consisting of four main functional pages: Homepage, Input, Analysis and Result. It covered the main operations needed to optimise the planning, which achieved an excellent usability performance evaluated by 8 participants in the online evaluation tests. It was found that showing information in an organised way(in this case I used cards and tabs) and provide enough guidance helped to reduce the time and fear of learning new software. All participants could finish the assigned tasks without hints in the evaluation test and show more willingness and confidence to learn Macomi Maintenance.

This project focuses on designing a new EEG experience for children visiting the Child Brain Lab at the Sophia Children’s Hospital. The Child Brain Lab will be a new space to do pediatric research for different neurological and psychological disorders. In this space there will be stations where children will do different brain tests, and one which is the EEG station. The initial goal of this project was to improve experience for children 6-12 years old by enhancing curiosity when going to the EEG station, to allow them to learn more about the EEG on their own terms. Literature and observational research was done to learn more about the different stakeholders and the context of the EEG, focusing on identifying moments of boredom, anxiety, and curiosity for the children visiting the EEG space. In addition, the moments of interaction between the child-patient and the parent and lab technician were looked at in relation to these emotions. The observational research led to detailed patient journey maps to be created for four patients who were doing an EEG test regarding the three emotions identified and the interactions between the users. The main insights found were that patients are usually prepared for the procedural side of the appointment but not really about what the EEG test does. This is due to the EEG test being difficult to understand, even for parents, and it becomes assumed that it is too abstract for children to grasp. Factors for how to spark curiosity were also identified through literature research: creating a safe space, building up anticipation, allowing children to predict what will happen, and integrating novel colors, sounds, or other effects. The insights from the research lead to many ideas through sketches and low fidelity prototypes to be developed during and after the research process. Different feedback sessions with patients, parents, and healthcare providers help define the concept direction: an interactive experience that children can play during the EEG to help them learn about what the EEG does on their own terms. The final design is Wavy, an interactive experience that utilizes projected images that interact with physical pieces to create a virtual and physical environment for children to explore ‘What an EEG does’ and to introduce parts of the procedure for children. Wavy shows how doing different activities affects the EEG reading. By placing electrodes pieces, children find brain waves and an activity knob allows children to change the activity, changing the brain waves patterns. The design has been evaluated through interviews with child-patients, their parents, lab technicians, and neurologists (n=14). A virtual interactive prototype was created to test with the child-patients and parents. Lab technicians and neurologists appreciate that the game helps engage children to be more actively a part of the EEG appointment. During the prototype evaluation, children were able to relate the Wavy experience to their own EEG experience and asked exploratory questions to their parents about the game and EEG.

Asthma is a chronic disease and is characterized by inflammations of the airways. Since there is no cure available yet, asthma treatment is aimed at asthma control, to minimize patients’ symptom experiences and to prevent patients of having exacerbations (lung attacks). A key driver in this, is the extent to which patients adhere to their prescribed medication treatment, also called ‘medication adherence’. It has been found that one third of Dutch asthma patients show poor adherence to their treatment.

The client of this project, the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, has developed a smart inhaler in combination with an application. This technology makes it possible to measure medication adherence and present the adherence data to patients and healthcare providers. However, if the motivation of patients remains low to take their medication as prescribed, such interventions will likely not succeed because patients may ignore the reminders sent. Therefore, the aim of this graduation project is to develop a proof of concept for a self-management eHealth intervention that motivates patients to adhere to their medication treatment.

This thesis describes the development of Ademgenoot, an asthma self-management application connected to a smart inhaler. Ademgenoot uses narrative game-elements to motivate asthma patients to adhere to their prescribed medication treatment. In this, Ademgenoot focuses on the positive outcomes of taking the daily maintenance medication. Moreover, the application gives the patients the opportunity to try-out the daily intake of the medication, by offering them a six weeks challenge linked to a personal goal. During this period Ademgenoot visualizes the process of the medication intake in a playful way to make the effect of the medication visible and to prevent disengagement. At the end of the challenge, patients should have gained insights on the effect of the intake of the daily medication and their improved symptom control within their daily lives.

The design process from investigating the user’s needs and values to various idea directions towards the final design will be discussed. In addition, this thesis includes the different research that was conducted to gain a better understanding behind patients’ motives to not follow their treatment, the conducted research on the difficult step of motivating people to change their behaviour and the different user tests that were set up.

A WhatsApp prototype was built to test the concept of Ademgenoot in practice. Patients received screens responding to their medication use for a couple of days via WhatsApp. The end user test delivered the proof of principle that the concept of Ademgenoot has the ability to motivate patients to adhere to their prescribed treatment. In addition, participants expressed to be enthusiastic about the concept and stated that they would like to use the application in their daily life. A positive side-effect appeared to be that some participants mentioned that it would help in the creation of a habit.

Follow-up studies are recommended on finding additional ways to track the development of the patients’ daily wellbeing within the application. This and other recommendations are presented in the final part of this thesis.