Intake Assessment Forms

• Save practitioners time and help them focus on one main issue for the session while still getting a holistic view of the patient
• Reduce practitioner risk through comprehensive questions
• Automate case setup with pre-populated data
• Provide richer context ahead of a session
• Centralise patient health data into one location
• Surface clear, actionable insights

With the acquisition of a successful and robust patient intake assessment it was important to understand what worked well and what could be improved. After trying it myself, getting feedback from users and physios, and retrieving data from the previous owners we built a well-rounded perspective on the existing product.

From a patient’s perspective:

• Lengthy form with unnecessary required fields
• Difficult selection of smaller body areas
• Lose where I am on the page when child questions appear
• Body chart interactions fiddly, especially on mobile
• Weak sense of progress, no reward or feedback
• Illogical grouping and order of questions
• Authentication upfront created friction and reduced completion likelihood
• Want to select multiple body areas

From a practitioner’s perspective:

• The report output was the most valuable artifact: trusted, scannable, and holistic
• Data guided the subjective session by surfacing areas to probe further
• Hierarchy and grouping of information needed to reflect clinical priorities
• Practitioner feedback pointed out patients find the form too long and are frustrated by the inability to add multiple problem areas
• Question order illogical in some instances

From a design perspective:

• Nested questions obscured hierarchy, losing clarity of parent/child relationships
• Wordy questions and poor balance between questions/answers made pages feel longer
• Illogical groupings and order of questions
• Lack of progress indication which is important for a long mundane form
• Difficult to use on mobile
• Duplicate pathways leading across body regions leading to inconsistencies in form content

Breaking the form into core parts:

• Defined reusable input components
• Established responsive page structures
• Identified opportunities for interaction and motion patterns (page transitions, bottom sheets/dialogs)
• Sequenced questions logically across main groups with feedback from key stakeholders

Integration into clinical workflows:

• Clinics use PMS systems for bookings, but VALD opted against PMS integration
• Explored introducing a generic link system containing org name and ID, enabling clinics to embed intake assessments into existing booking workflows
• Session tokens and unique identifiers (email-based) could ensure data consistency
• To reduce complexity for the MVP it was decided to use the existing invites auth system only and force users to create a password and log in before viewing the form assigned to them

Patient form:

• One focus per page (not always one question)
• Progressive disclosure to handle nested questions
• Chunking and illusion of progress to reduce cognitive load (Miller’s Law, goal gradient effect)
• Feedback and acknowledgement to build trust in a vulnerable healthcare context

Practitioner report:

• Clear hierarchy of information
• Insights at a glance, grouped by relevance
• Flagged information separated for visibility
• Reduced reliance on raw answer lists to reduce cognitive load

• Identified “global” vs “dynamic” pages to simplify content maintenance
• 18 of 22 pages were identical across body pathways (global)
• Dynamic pages used body area props (e.g. hip is ‘true’) to conditionally show/hide content
• This reduced duplication, minimised human error, and simplified updates

Being the first major step of the form that determines your questions it was critical to get this interaction right for drop-off reduction. We needed to consider a diverse group of users (e.g., “Janice,” a 68-year-old less tech-savvy patient). A few methods were explored from a visual and interactive perspective.

3D body chart:

• Pros: Intuitive mapping to the body
• Cons: Complex interactions (orbiting, zoom), gender perception risks, higher dev cost

2D chart:

• Pros: Familiar, gender-neutral, cheaper to design/build
• Cons: Required a two-step interaction (region → detailed area)

The outcome was a 2D chart chosen for accessibility, simplicity, and inclusivity. It also fits into the broader brand seamlessly.

• Integrate form natively into the MoveHealth app
• Introduce micro-interactions for encouragement and feedback
• Enhance automation via generic links
• Surface intake data in VALD Hub timelines
• Use intake data as context for AI-generated clinical notes

• Form completion rate
• Average time to complete
• Form start rate
• Time saved per patient
• Practitioner note quality