Being ‘a patient’ can be stigmatising enough, so the technology you use needs to be simple. It needs to feel empathetic, supportive and joyous to use.
At Careology, we spend a lot of time thinking about the people who use our products. Who are they? What daily decisions are they making? How are they feeling at different stages of their treatment? How are they keeping their loved ones updated? Are they remembering to share the full extent of how they’re coping, when they talk to their consultant?
For people living and dealing with cancer, their days become a whirlwind of appointments, tests, treatments and medication. Cancer also comes with its own language - a whole new dictionary of medical jargon that’s hard to pronounce, let alone understand. There’s a lot to digest. We understand that reassurance, personalisation and practical support is what’s needed most with the technology that’s used.
We keep that in mind, constantly asking ourselves “how can we make Careology easier to use?” We invest heavily in our product design, ensuring it’s consumerised and engaging. And we’re always listening, designing and iterating with input from patients, caregivers and clinicians.
We also look at our user experience and anonymised data to see how people are interacting with our products.
Who is using Careology?
The average age of our users is 41 years old. With our youngest user being 13 and our oldest being 80. The majority of our engaged users are between 45-55 years. 52% or our users are female and 43% are male. (The remaining 5% have not specified their gender.) Within this user group, we are supporting over 30 different types of cancer, with Breast, Bowel, Lung, Prostate and Blood cancers being the most common.
How are people using Careology?
Our most engaged users use Careology for 25 days per month. With the average engagement rate across our users being 16 days per month. Their average daily engagement is 19 minutes 53 seconds per day, with 9 events per session. The practical support provided by our Medication Reminders and Symptom Logging mean they're our most popular features, making up 60% of usage.
What outcomes have we found, so far?
In a recent pilot, we saw a 70% conversion from referral to registered user. These users gave Careology a 4/5 star rating for user satisfaction. The organisation who ran the pilot gave us a 5/5 star satisfaction rating. We also have a 4.7 star rating on the iOS App Store.
What are our users saying about Careology?
"You get so many apps out there but you can tell Careology comes from someone who really understands.” - Careology User
"I love the simplicity of selecting my mood, that’s my favourite feature! It’s great to have a record for when I go back to see my oncologist." - Careology User
"Careology really helped whilst I was in hospital to keep my husband connected and to enable him to contribute to my consultation with the oncologist even though he was only able to attend by phone. It’s helped him to understand how I’m feeling day to day to help provide the support I need." - Careology User
"Careology provides me with a great place to organise, update and manage my symptoms and medication. Having the history and dates to go back to when talking to my doctor and nurses makes things a lot easier. And it gives them the information they require to narrow down the root cause and find a solution to the problem. I give Careology a 5/5 for my stint of using it during my chemotherapy, particularly because I’m not usually great with organisation. It suited me very well being able to have all the useful tools such as medicines, symptoms and calendar in one place.” - Careology User
And, what about our security, stability and data privacy?
Our technology incorporates a range of measures to ensure security and resilience - incorporating elements such as firewalls, encryption at rest and in motion, access management and authentication, system monitoring and intelligent threat detection. We are Cyber Essentials certified and are committed to undertaking regular penetration testing to ensure the proactive identification of any vulnerabilities. We have demonstrated 100% crash free usage over the last 12 months. We also work hard to ensure strong data governance and privacy measures are in place. Ranging from our infrastructure through to our policies, training and supplier agreements, we keep all such areas under constant review based on changing regulations, client needs and internal standards.
Our mission is to transform traditional cancer care. With consumerised digital solutions that are connected, intuitive and easy for everyone to use. If you have any feedback or suggestions for us, please get in touch - hello@careology.health