I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
Test for robustness
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl Similar experience: 70+ yo person having to deal with expired X.509 certificates (.gov.hu app) - what are these devs smoking?? -
@grammargirl the app my 79 year old husband has to use to order his medicines has, at one point, two buttons that should say yes and no. Or maybe confirm and deny. But instead some hip tech bro decided they would say 'sounds good to me' and 'change'
Every time he asks me which one means yes
@Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl "Sounds good to me" is a weird OK, but it doesn't seem unclear either?
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl I'm especially not a fan of pages whose basic, core functionality changes on mobile. If you need to change how it's arranged, I understand, but let me at least navigate all of it. I've taken to toggling desktop mode (and having to scroll all around a huge page of tiny text) to check whether anything's missing.
Mostly I've given up on doing meaningful things on mobile. I need my laptop.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
I think the problems with those portals go far beyond an 85 yr old's perception.
Everytime I go to another doctor they enroll me in a different web portal. Without exception, the actual doctor's in those offices have all expressed to me how much their portal sucks. And they do. Big Time. I'm in three of them now.
My doctors encourage me not to use the portals for anything other than looking up test results. And some of the portals suck for doing that too.
One of the 3 I'm in got hacked and my info is now in the hands of whoever. Medical offices are not good with network security policy.
So why do they have them? Insurance companies force them to, and the cost of obtaining and maintaining said useless portals is passed along to patients.
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@Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl "Sounds good to me" is a weird OK, but it doesn't seem unclear either?
@stilescrisis @grammargirl its the fact the other option isn't no. So you are thinking, I want to make the order, is that I'm changing the order or do I think the order sounds good? Plus at 79 the phrase 'sounds good' isn't something he would ever say. It's just not a form of speech he's used to and it's unnecessarily complicated
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@stilescrisis @grammargirl its the fact the other option isn't no. So you are thinking, I want to make the order, is that I'm changing the order or do I think the order sounds good? Plus at 79 the phrase 'sounds good' isn't something he would ever say. It's just not a form of speech he's used to and it's unnecessarily complicated
@Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl I don't know. "That sounds good" is plain, simple English to me. My 70-something parents would understand it perfectly fine. Is this an American vs British English thing?
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl
To every product developer, including web developers, LARGER FONTS PLEASE.Signed, person cursing you in absentia for using tiny fonts
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl It's fairly simple:
If you're sending someone a PDF (or similar) via a text or an "app" then FFS also send an email so that the poor punter can read it on a real screen.
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@grammargirl
To every product developer, including web developers, LARGER FONTS PLEASE.Signed, person cursing you in absentia for using tiny fonts
Seconded!
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@grammargirl
To every product developer, including web developers, LARGER FONTS PLEASE.Signed, person cursing you in absentia for using tiny fonts
@shansterable @grammargirl As long as we're here, this should apply to age dates on bottles of pasta sauce, too. Dinky fonts in black with tomato sauce behind them are not helpful.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl or just forced to use the app they developed for the purpose it was developed. I'll bet none of the coders of that portal actually have to use it
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl I feel this so much. I’ve helped family members with various medical sites and trying to get some things done has been possible only because I have a lot of technical skills and worked something out that should have been obvious. It absurd how broken some of these are. Or just obnoxious in other ways. One hospital system makes me sign unchanged paperwork for nearly every appointment no matter how recent the last was. Another one - that uses the same underlying platform! - has been configured to only ask once a year.
I worked somewhere previously that did a lot of software development for payment services. I noticed that a lot of the issue with bad user experience in the software for internal staff (e.g. sales, support folks, etc) came of the developers having no concrete experience of USING the processes they were writing the software to do. I wonder how much that comes into play with healthcare platforms. Wouldn’t be surprised if it’s A Lot.
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I think the problems with those portals go far beyond an 85 yr old's perception.
Everytime I go to another doctor they enroll me in a different web portal. Without exception, the actual doctor's in those offices have all expressed to me how much their portal sucks. And they do. Big Time. I'm in three of them now.
My doctors encourage me not to use the portals for anything other than looking up test results. And some of the portals suck for doing that too.
One of the 3 I'm in got hacked and my info is now in the hands of whoever. Medical offices are not good with network security policy.
So why do they have them? Insurance companies force them to, and the cost of obtaining and maintaining said useless portals is passed along to patients.
@Sunny @grammargirl
Another reason they have and require use of the portals is because the profit-seeking parent of the hospital/physician firm/etc uses the portal to insulate the mgt and the billing dept from patients and clients. It's impossible to get errors corrected. -
@Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl I don't know. "That sounds good" is plain, simple English to me. My 70-something parents would understand it perfectly fine. Is this an American vs British English thing?
@stilescrisis @Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl to you. To you. To you. That is not a benchmark of accessible design. To everybody is what you're aiming for.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
Some time between 2010 and 2012, #Usability totally went down the gutter and never recovered.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
Once upon a time a long time ago, web development used to be an honourable profession and quality output was valued, and budgeted for!
Sadly, all these things are no longer relevant because greed and hate.
I left the profession, it used to be good, but it's really not any more.
My personal advice is to flat out refuse digital and demand paper
In the UK at least they are obliged to provide it.
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@stilescrisis @Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl to you. To you. To you. That is not a benchmark of accessible design. To everybody is what you're aiming for.
@Iwillyeah @Tattooed_Mummy @grammargirl I suspect "confirm" and "deny" (your earlier idea) would be much less accessible in testing. Nothing is going to be perfect. Even "Yes" and "No" can be confusing in some contexts.
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Once upon a time a long time ago, web development used to be an honourable profession and quality output was valued, and budgeted for!
Sadly, all these things are no longer relevant because greed and hate.
I left the profession, it used to be good, but it's really not any more.
My personal advice is to flat out refuse digital and demand paper
In the UK at least they are obliged to provide it.
@kel I definitely came away feeling like it would be easier to just show up 30 minutes early and do the paperwork in person.
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I'm helping an elderly person with a patient portal, and wow, there are about 4 different problems ranging from unclear instructions to pages that don't work well when the phone is zoomed in enough for an older person to actually read the text.
Plus, the iPhone keeps popping up unhelpful gunk.
This person isn't particularly afraid of technology either, but they literally can't do it.
I now think every web developer should be forced to walk through their processes with an 85-year-old.
@grammargirl
Haha don’t get me started with that
