UX Patterns for Health

Health services are used at awkward moments. A parent is booking an appointment for a child who is unwell. A patient is entering medication history while in pain. A nurse is switching between people and screens on a busy ward. In each case a small design mistake, such as a confusing error, can mean a missed appointment, a wrong entry or a person giving up. Patterns exist so teams do not solve these recurring problems from scratch.

A pattern is a reusable, tested solution to a problem that keeps coming up: asking for a date, confirming an action, telling someone that something went wrong. Public-sector design systems publish them for specific tasks and page types; the NHS service manual, for example, groups them into things to ask users for, things to help users do, and whole pages such as a start page or a page that checks answers. Patterns are starting points, not proof: each was tested in a particular service, so a health team still needs to check them with its own patients and staff.

Cognitive load: spending attention where it matters

Cognitive load is the mental effort needed to take in and hold information. A 2024 narrative review of electronic health record use describes three kinds: effort that comes from the task itself, effort added by how information is presented, and effort spent building understanding. Good patterns cut the second kind, so that attention goes to the task rather than to decoding the screen.

The same review reports that too many decision-support alerts lead staff to miss important information, and that interruptive alerts are linked to lower acceptance and more errors. The lesson for patterns is restraint: whatever interrupts should be rare, or it stops working.

Preventing errors, then recovering from them

Use error means a person doing something other than what was intended. The US FDA's human factors guidance for medical devices describes a process manufacturers can follow to lower the chance of use errors and resulting harm. Health software can take the same approach: treat error as something to design against.

• Prevent first. The NHS error-message guidance says good form design should come before error messages, and that eligibility or permission problems belong on an explanatory page rather than in an error.
• Check before committing. A check-answers page lets people review what they entered and change any item before sending. The NHS guidance stresses that the transaction is not complete until the person confirms.
• Interrupt sparingly. An interruption page is meant for a likely mistake or an action that cannot be undone, such as cancelling an appointment. The NHS guidance warns that the more often people see one, the more likely they are to skip it.
• Recover kindly. GOV.UK guidance says to validate when someone tries to continue, keep what they typed, move focus to a summary of problems at the top and repeat each message beside its field. Messages should say how to fix the problem rather than describe what went wrong.
• Accept natural input. For a remembered date such as a birth date, separate day, month and year fields suit people. For a date copied from a document, matching the document's format reduces transcription errors. A calendar picker should supplement typing, not replace it.

Asking questions without losing people

Health history forms can be long. The NHS question-pages guidance makes one question per page the default, so people can focus on what is being asked. It allows grouping only when research supports it, for example in an internal tool where staff repeat tasks quickly. Back links are expected because some people do not trust the browser's back button. Progress indicators come after testing shows they are needed.

Endings matter too. The NHS confirmation-page guidance describes a clear message that the task is done and what happens next, with a reference number only if the person needs to keep one. Too many components on the page can overwhelm people.

Telehealth: getting into the visit

Telehealth adds a device, a connection and a camera to an already stressful appointment. In a 2021 survey of 180 patients who had completed video visits, about one in five reported some technical difficulty, each kind (video, connection, audio, setup, waits) affecting a small share. Most respondents were still positive. Because the survey covers people who completed a visit, it cannot show how many gave up before joining.

A 2020 survey of 764 US veterans given tablets for video care found 86.1 percent agreed the equipment was easy to use and 83.4 percent agreed the technology was secure. Easy joining, a sense of security and a plan for poor connections all belong in the design.

Two examples

Cancelling an appointment. A patient taps cancel on a booking. Rather than removing it instantly, the service shows one focused page that names the appointment, says what cancelling means and offers a clear way back. Afterwards a confirmation states what happened and how to rebook.

Joining a video visit. The join screen shows the time, the clinician's name and one main button, and says in plain words that the camera will be used. A waiting state says the clinician has not joined yet and nothing more is needed. If the connection fails, the page follows the NHS App error-page guidance: say what the problem is, offer one recovery action such as trying again, and give another way to be seen, such as a phone call, without blame or technical error codes.

Related Showcase card

• The error summary - an NHS design system pattern applied to a repeat-prescription form.