Ask What Matters

Project Overview

A close friend recently described years of searching for answers to a wide range of symptoms that were hard to pin down, harder to treat, and exhausting to explain to doctors who weren't quite connecting the dots. Ask What Matters is a branching medical scenario for healthcare professionals and frontline support staff - the people who may be among the first to notice that a patient's symptoms are forming a pattern.

Challenge

The core challenge isn't simply a knowledge gap. It's a recognition gap. Symptoms may appear separately, develop gradually, or seem unrelated until someone begins seeing the larger pattern. The learning challenge was to help learners move from individual observations toward a stronger clinical picture while practicing better questions, stronger next steps, and patient-centered communication.

Design Approach

I designed the module as a realistic patient journey from front-desk intake through physician assessment using branching pathways, role-based perspectives, and two gaming-style feedback meters. Rather than simply asking learners to recall information, the experience asks them to recognize patterns, make clinical decisions under uncertainty, and communicate in ways that encourage the patient to keep sharing information.

Outcome

Based on feedback from my SME, I updated the personas, sharpened the measurable outcomes, and strengthened the story arc. Her perspective helped me look more carefully at what the patient experiences as well as what the healthcare professional needs to notice.