MATCH! A diabetes patient platform to facilitate new peer friendships

Abstract

This Master Thesis focuses on exploring the possibilities of facilitating peer support possibilities between diabetes type 1 patients, as a valuable addition to a patient’s normal support network. This report presents the results of the analysis phase, the developed concepts and the final outcomes of this master thesis.

Diabetes is a disease that is mainly managed by the patients themselves. Improving or failing within this disease has various input on a patient’s emotional balance. Having to deal with this disease every day, each patient develops an individual diabetes management style that is influenced by his/her personality, the surroundings and the relation with the professional care giver. As every patient has a different personality, the interviewed patients showed great differences within their management and mindset. As in real life when searching for new friends, the patients expressed the wish to get in contact with other peers, who would match their diabetes mindset, to be able to recognize problems and emphasize.

The developed concept Match! is an online patient platform that enables every diabetes patient to create an individual profile and display his/her diabetes mindset together with other additional info the patient would like to add that shows the person behind the diabetes. Match!’s goal is to let peers find contact points and similarities with other peers, in order to increase the chance of developing a friendship with the matching peer. The concept focuses on the profile creation process, the display of the mindset and facilitation between peers.