Patients come to hospital because they are sick. However, a patient’s illness may be grounded in psychological, cultural, behavioral, social, financial, or legal causes. The healthcare system is expert at treating medical problems, but lacks resources to identify these private and possibly taboo aspects of patient’s life.
Inter-Woven Life is designed to facilitate such conversations between heart failure patients and case managers at St. Joseph Health System, Ann Arbor. The set, a graphic chart and booklet, explicitly acknowledges all areas of someone’s life which may affect their health and wellness, opening the scope of discussion in hospital settings beyond medical care.
Aditi Bidkar is a 2017 MDes in Integrative Design candidate.
