May 15, 2026 at 3:23 pm

Mobile UI/UX • App Design • UX of AI • Health

infirma

Managing something as personal and high-stakes as your health can be overwhelming, whether you're at home unsure what your symptoms mean, deciding if they're serious enough to seek care, or sitting in a doctor's office struggling to remember when everything started.

In 2024, after experiencing COVID-19 for the first time, I began designing Infirma… a health resource I wished I had during that. When revisiting the project in 2026, advances in AI opened new possibilities to make the concept more personalized and informative.

I designed Infirma to be an AI-powered health companion that helps users better understand their symptoms, track changes over time, and access trustworthy health information. Core experiences include a symptom matcher, a symptom timeline and calendar, day-by-day illness guidance, and medication and appointment tracking.

Rather than replacing real healthcare professionals, it makes navigating your body less overwhelming like a smart companion that helps users feel more informed and confident in making health decisions.

Home

01 — PROBLEM

People are navigating their health alone

When something feels off (ex. a pounding headache, unusual fatigue, a symptom that won't go away) most people turn to Google. They end up down rabbit holes of worst case scenarios, generic advice, and information they can't verify. By the time they reach a healthcare provider, they've forgotten when symptoms started, how severe they were, or how they progressed over time.

This disconnect isn't just frustrating, it affects the efficiency and quality of care, incomplete conversations with doctors, and anxiety that comes from not knowing what's happening in your own body. Infirma was designed to solve this.

When something feels off (ex. a pounding headache, unusual fatigue, a symptom that won't go away) most people turn to Google. They end up down rabbit holes of worst case scenarios, generic advice, and information they can't verify. By the time they reach a healthcare provider, they've forgotten when symptoms started, how severe they were, or how they progressed over time.

This disconnect isn't just frustrating, it affects the efficiency and quality of care, incomplete conversations with doctors, and anxiety that comes from not knowing what's happening in your own body. Infirma was designed to solve this.

"Patients who arrive prepared get better care. The barrier isn't access to information but it's moreso the ability to make sense of it and manage it."

02 — RESEARCH

Understanding the patient landscape

[0]

To validate the problem, I conducted a rapid user survey with 120 respondents, exploring how people currently manage health concerns, track symptoms, and decide when to see a professional.

40.0%

45.0%

40.0%

turn to Google first for health concerns.

75.0%

83.0%

75.0%

don't consistently track symptoms at all.

40.0%

45.0%

40.0%

delay care because they're unsure if it's serious.

Where do you go first when you have a health concern?

Google

Friends & Family

Primary Physician

AI/ChatGPT

53 people

29 people

17 people

11 people

48.7%

24.4%

14.3%

9.24%

Where do you go first when you have a health concern?

Google

Friends & Family

Primary Physician

AI/ChatGPT

53 people

29 people

17 people

11 people

48.7%

24.4%

14.3%

9.24%

KEY PAIN POINT

37% of respondents struggled to recall symptom timelines when speaking to a healthcare provider in the past 6 months.

The results confirmed three common problems and concerns… 1. People lack a reliable place to log and revisit their health data, 2. The tools that exist (Google, notes) aren't specifically for health context, 3. Finally uncertainty, not accessing the info itself, is the primary issue for those seeking care.

The results confirmed three common problems and concerns… 1. People lack a reliable place to log and revisit their health data, 2. The tools that exist (Google, notes) aren't specifically for health context, 3. Finally uncertainty, not accessing the info itself, is the primary issue for those seeking care.

03 — DESIGN GOALS

Guiding the experience

Before designing a single screen, I wanted to clearly flesh out the 3 most important experiences I want users to experience.

Trusted AI, not a replacement

AI analyzes patterns to help users understand what they're experiencing but never acts as a replacement for a doctor. Every AI-generated output is informational and NOT diagnostic.

Simple Onboarding

Safe Space

Trusted AI, not a replacement

AI analyzes patterns to help users understand what they're experiencing but never acts as a replacement for a doctor. Every AI-generated output is informational and NOT diagnostic.

Simple Onboarding

Safe Space

04 — SOLUTION

Bridging the gap between symptoms and care

Infirma is a personal health companion that gives users an organized private space to log what's happening in their bodies, which helps them make sense of it. The apps main goals are to organize, find health patterns and trends, and makes getting professional care easier.

Rather than replacing the doctor visit, Infirma makes that visit significantly more productive. If users arrive with a timestamped log of their symptoms, medication history, and severity progression, they walk in so much more prepared. The conversation shifts from "I think it started maybe two weeks ago?" to "here's exactly what I've been experiencing."

Infirma is a personal health companion that gives users an organized private space to log what's happening in their bodies, which helps them make sense of it. The apps main goals are to organize, find health patterns and trends, and makes getting professional care easier.

Rather than replacing the doctor visit, Infirma makes that visit significantly more productive. If users arrive with a timestamped log of their symptoms, medication history, and severity progression, they walk in so much more prepared. The conversation shifts from "I think it started maybe two weeks ago?" to "here's exactly what I've been experiencing."

05 — KEY FEATURES

What Infirma does

TAP SCREENS TO EXPAND◝(ᵔᗜᵔ)◜

Welcoming Onboarding

Get started in minutes. Infirma asks a few key questions upfront so every recommendation, insight, and article feels personalized to you from day one.

Welcoming Onboarding

Get started in minutes. Infirma asks a few key questions upfront so every recommendation, insight, and article feels personalized to you from day one.

Welcoming Onboarding

Get started in minutes. Infirma asks a few key questions upfront so every recommendation, insight, and article feels personalized to you from day one.

Symptom Logging

Symptom Logging

& Health Event Logging

Log symptoms with severity ratings, timestamps, and optional notes. Track medications, dosages, and appointments in one place.

& Health Event Logging

Log symptoms with severity ratings, timestamps, and optional notes. Track medications, dosages, and appointments in one place.

Calendar View

See all your logged symptoms and events in one monthly calendar. Track health progress and understand how your health shifts over time.

Calendar View

See all your logged symptoms and events in one monthly calendar. Track health progress and understand how your health shifts over time.

Recovery Insights

Track recovery score, medication adherence, symptom severity trends, and most common symptoms.

Find Care Nearby

Find nearby clinics, ERs, urgent cares, and doctors filterable by specialization, distance, and insurance. Get directions or call in one tap.

Find Care Nearby

Find nearby clinics, ERs, urgent cares, and doctors filterable by specialization, distance, and insurance. Get directions or call in one tap.

Find Care Nearby

Find nearby clinics, ERs, urgent cares, and doctors filterable by specialization, distance, and insurance. Get directions or call in one tap.

Find Care Nearby

Find nearby clinics, ERs, urgent cares, and doctors filterable by specialization, distance, and insurance. Get directions or call in one tap.

Curated Health Articles

AI-curated articles from trusted sources such as CDC, NIH, peer-reviewed journals. Article recomendation and suggestions are based on what the user is currently tracking and relevent, important news, not just trending content.

Curated Health Articles

06 — DESIGN PROCESS

From research to interface

Research Synthesis

I analyzed 120 survey responses to learn how users deal with their health concerns, track symptoms, and decide when to seek professional care. The results and data made me realize a core tension that all users want answers and ease their health concerns, whether it be Googling symptoms or talking to friends and family.

Misaligned Tools: Current online resources (ex. Google, notes app) are not purpose-built nor do they have specialized features for medical and health contexts

Clarity Gap: The anxiety and uncertainty surrounding your own body and health is what leads to the barrier for users trying to decide whether to get professional care.

Early Ideation

I knew I wanted specific user journeys like logging a symptom, reviewing health history, analyzing potential illnesses, and locating nearby facilities and being able to filter by insurance and distance.

To turn my ideas into acutal structures...

Early Wireframing: Sketched low-fidelity layouts to quickly iterate on user interaction patterns, focusing heavily on the structural hierarchy of the home page.

Core Feature Layouts: The first core features I ideated for the app were the Symptom-Illness Matcher and the Sickness Tracker which I visualized layouts for and made that despite having so much information, they were still intuitive and low-friction for users.

Visual Language

I conducted thorough competitive analysis of similar health & wellness and tracking platforms, and came to draw significant inspiration from period tracking apps like Flo and Clu. Features from their app including menstrual cycle prediction, monthly calendars, and cycle insights felt useful and informative which I wanted to capture in my app.

By studying how they successfully balance dense health data with welcoming, non-clinical interfaces, I established a distinct visual identity for this application:

Version 1 — 2024

I designed the first iteration with all major screens including the home page, illness analysis feature, and articles feed. Especially after doing competitive analysis, the UX flow being intuitive and seamless was important to me. I wanted every action to be intuitive and easy because reducing complexity and user effort is key for long-term user consistency.

The homepage featured a weekly calendar where past days with logged symptoms were shaded and future days were also shaded to indicate predicted symptom duration. Below it, a module displayed what day of the illness you were on with a 'Read More' button that opened a dedicated page covering expected symptoms, your reported symptoms, recommended steps for that specific day, treatment options, and when to seek medical help. At the bottom of the homepage, curated articles from trusted government and health organizations kept users informed without exposing them to misinformation.

This version was intentionally minimal. It solved the immediate problem having easy access to information and information organization during illness. But there was still significant room to grow.

Version 1 — 2024

Version 2 — 2026

Returning to Infirma in 2026 with fresh eyes, a biology minor, and real user research in hand, the gaps in the first version became clear. Users needed more than just passive information — they needed tools that actively worked with them. The original design had no way to input or track symptoms beyond a surface level, no medication tracking, no way to find care, and no personalization.

Returning to Infirma in 2026 with fresh eyes, real user research in hand, and a new digital landscape, I was ready to build upon the app and fill in the gaps to make it everything I had imagined before, especially with the new resources to help me. I wanted the newer version to actively work with users personalized information rather than giving out general passive information, like in the past version.

The visual design, while functional, leaned too warm and lacked the clarity and trust signals a health app demands. The redesign addressed all of these directly.

The original design had no way to input or track symptoms beyond a surface level, no medication tracking, no way to find care, and no personalization. Additionally, the visual design, while functional, leaned too warm and lacked the clarity and trust an app about something so vulnerable and like human health demands.

Leveraging AI Tools

I wanted to work with the AI tools that are currently reshaping and revolutionizing the design landscape today. But rather than letting it do all the work, I simply wanted to use it to help expedite tedious process and be my thinking and brainstorming partner, so I could keep control of the direction and design decisions.

Visual Direction and Moodboarding with Midjourney

Before trying to opening Figma and working on the app itself, I first used Midjourney to to establish the visual and emotional tone of the redesign.

Before opening Figma, I used Midjourney to visualize the emotional tone and theme of this redesign. I wanted to go in a different direction in terms of visuals from the first warm version. The first version of Infirma used warm oranges and beiges that felt cozy but not credible. A health app deals with users sensitive information, so trust and comfort is priority and I wanted to find a visual language that felt safe and informed without feeling like a hospital.

I also utilized Midjourney’s moodboard feature to input images of my old design and also the competitive analysis I had done on other health tracking apps like Flo, Clue, Apple Health, etc. I attached the moodboard I created along with my prompts.

Exploring UI Layouts with Google Stitch

Hi-Fi Prototyping with Lovable

Refinement & Handoff with Figma AI

Midjourney

Iteration & User Feedback

Additions & Design Decisions

Onboarding

Redesigned Homescreen

Navigation

07 — REFLECTION

Final thoughts & takeaways