This was a 6 months contract with a Sydney-based Medication Management System. Case study and screens are changed to preserve client confidentiality.

The interface was outdated, inaccessible, and difficult to use - especially in high-pressure, clinical environments. The goal: modernise the UI without overhauling the layout, improve usability across experience levels, and ensure compliance with accessibility standards.

We interviewed existing customers and internal stakeholders to gather valuable insights, conducting a total of 30 interviews. Along with the initial discovery and UI Audit, this enabled us to generate key insights.

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Key Insights

• Visual language reinforces bias and confusion‍
  • Gendered and unclear iconography creates cognitive friction and alienates users, reducing trust and company perception.
• Poor contrast is slowing users down
  • Low-contrast UI elements made essential actions harder to find, increasing user frustration and error rates.
• Support pathways are hidden, increasing workload‍
  • Users couldn’t find the ‘Contact Us’ button, leading to an overflow of minor queries to the CS team.
• Ineffective colour strategy blocks user focus‍
  • Poor use of colour reduced task prioritisation, accessibility, and confidence - especially for colour blind users.
• Mobile experience fails to support core workflows‍
  • Lack of mobile optimisation disrupts prescribers’ on-the-go tasks, leading to frustration and workaround behaviours.
• Visual clutter is hiding vital information
  • ‍Poor alignment and spacing reduced scannability, making it easy to miss critical patient data.

User Needs

• Medication workflows must support speed and safety‍
  • Interfaces should streamline task execution without compromising accuracy, enabling users to administer medication confidently and efficiently.
• Critical signals must cut through the noise‍
  • Alerts, errors, and urgent tasks need to be instantly recognisable to prevent delays, mistakes, or safety breaches in high-pressure environments.
• Essential information must lead the interface‍
  • Key details and safety checks should be surfaced prominently, guiding users through compliant, error-free workflows

Challenges

• Colour blind users couldn’t rely on colour-coded indicators alone.
• Low contrast text and icons were hard to see in information dense pages.
• Important blocks of text were poorly aligned, impacting readability and increasing error risk.

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Design Recommendations

✅ Meet WCAG contrast standards

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✅ Use colour-blind-safe hues and additional cues (icons + text) for alerts

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✅ Improve visual hierarchy through consistent spacing (4pt system)

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✅ Improve modal clarity and reduce user error by introducing a distinct destructive button state and more informative, action-oriented copy

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Usability Testing

New Users:

• Found the updated homepage intuitive and easier to navigate
• Adapted quickly due to lack of entrenched habits

Experienced Users:

• More resistant to change, but provided deeper, critical feedback
• Pointed out concerns around layout density and scrolling

Patient Detail Pages:

• Seen as much clearer and easier to read than current design
• Some users found the amount of content overwhelming and “scroll-heavy”

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Further Design Improvements

• Adjust button styling for better visual clarity (e.g. less flat, stronger icon emphasis)
• Decrease vertical spacing on detail pages to reduce scrolling
• Increase cell height in large tables to improve visibility for visually impaired users

• Higher confidence in workflows among new users
• Improved accessibility across the board (WCAG AA compliant)
• Reduced dependency on support for basic queries
• Design system and spacing strategy now set up for scalable mobile optimisation

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What I Learned

• Accessibility isn’t just about colour - it’s about structure, spacing, and clarity.
• Simplicity often outperforms complexity, especially in safety-critical systems.
• Bringing user voices in early and often helped guide change-resistant teams to alignment.