LAVI — Problem Statement

LAVI · UX Case Study · Duration: 8 weeks · Role: Certified UX Designer (solo) · Figma VS Code · Section 01 of 12

01: Problem statement

Why LAVI exists

Personal motivation

"As a child of immigrants, I watched my parents leave doctor's appointments with more questions than they arrived with. They'd sit across from a physician who spoke in terms they didn't understand, nod along, and walk out holding paperwork that meant nothing to them. Without the language to ask the right questions or the medical literacy to interpret the answers, they ended up in a cycle, test after test, procedure after procedure, costs mounting, confusion growing. Nobody explained what was happening or why. I built LAVI because I never want another family to feel that lost inside a system that's supposed to help them."

— Rose, Certified UX Designer & daughter of immigrants

Over 45 million immigrants live in the United States, with Haitian and Hispanic communities among the fastest-growing and most underserved in healthcare access. Language barriers, cultural mistrust, and limited health literacy create a compounding cycle of confusion, delayed care, and preventable financial burden. Existing health apps were not built for this population, and it shows.

67%

of limited-English-proficient patients report misunderstanding their diagnosis or discharge instructions after a medical visit

AHRQ Health Literacy Report

2.4×

more likely to experience a preventable medical complication when language support is absent, a mistake that could have been avoided

Joint Commission, 2023

1 in 3

Hispanic adults delay or avoid medical care entirely due to language barriers combined with fear of unexpected costs

Commonwealth Fund, 2023

Language barriers

Medical appointments are conducted primarily in English. Interpretation services are inconsistent, and Haitian Creole speakers are especially underserved, most translation tools and health apps stop at Spanish.

Low health literacy

Discharge papers, prescription labels, and referral forms use clinical language inaccessible to patients without formal medical education. No existing consumer app rewrites this content in plain language across multiple languages.

Confusing medication instructions

Dosage schedules, drug interaction warnings, and refill procedures are rarely translated or simplified, leading to missed doses, incorrect timing, and avoidable medical complications, as documented in user research.

No path to culturally competent care

Finding a Haitian Creole or Spanish-speaking doctor who accepts Medicaid is a fragmented, time-consuming process with no centralized resource, forcing many patients to abandon the search and rely on costly emergency rooms.

How might we

"How might we design a mobile health literacy tool that empowers Haitian and Hispanic immigrants to understand their symptoms, medications, and care options, in their own language, in plain terms, without requiring prior medical knowledge?"

This question guided every design decision across the 8-week project, from information architecture and user flows through to the final hi-fi prototype and two rounds of usability testing.