TORONTO—Of the 64 sessions at this year’s North by Northeast Interactive, which took place June 13-19, 33 were panels with moderators and 11 other sessions featured more than one speaker. One successful panel, Your Health in Your Hand, happened in an unlikely morning time slot from an equally unlikely mix of presenters. Two doctors, a filmmaker and two other business leaders presented their work in one of the most interesting arenas where design and people-centred technology intersect: healthcare-focused mobile apps.

The app featured in this session that seemed to have the most considered design treatment was Bant, a tool to help diabetes patients manage their own treatment. Bant syncs the patient's phone with external glucose measurement devices within seconds and lets patients sort their readings by time of day and activity. Dr. Joseph Cafazzo, of Toronto General Hospital and faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto, as well as Bant's spokesperson, emphasized the collaborative aspect of building the Bant app. While design and development are carried out internally, his team receives feedback from the Health Care Human Factors Group as well as from patients in the Sick Kids program. Bant is currently in the stages of a trial testing community to make the app stickier for kids, with solutions that include a social network to connect diabetic patients with each other (often kids who have never met another diabetic in real life) and an incentives-based program that provides patients with iTunes stores credits, air miles, or other intangible rewards for healthy behavior.

Dr. Lyssa Neel of VitalHub Corp also presented an app with an emphasis on design and usability. VitalHub's user-base, however, is for the folks behind the scenes – the doctors, nurses, physical therapists, and even hospital cleaners who are involved in patient care. Currently limited to the network within a single hospital, VitalHub is "never two swipes away from the information they need," said Dr. Neel. Neel also testified her team had managed to simplify the complicated software currently in use in hospitals in exchange for a more intuitive user interface. She says, "Why can't doctors, nurses, social workers have the same kind of app that every other person can download? [...] If apps aren't usable, no one's going to use it."