Kevin Wu

Preventing Broken Hearts: Cardiovascular Disease Prevention for Millenials

The project goal was to generate actionable concepts and prototypes on the topic of awareness in cardiovascular health for people in the millennial population demographic.

“This is a collaborative project with two members of the class; Walter Yim and Katherine Valenzuela. The project goal was to create concepts and prototypes on the topic of awareness in cardiovascular health for people in the millennial population demographic. We would also like for people to gravitate themselves towards C-change, a nationally endorsed guideline process in Canada that targets primary health care practitioners and their healthcare relationships with patients.Our team took this project to heart and looked at the demographic that made most sense to us. We decided to create change through raising awareness about improving cardiovascular health in the Millennial population. Millennials are the largest demographic in North America and a high-risk group for future cardiovascular disease. In our Design for Health program Cohort, it is also the largest demographic.Millennials were the target of this project, not just because they are the largest demographic in North America, but also because they are difficult to reach with health information. They are an at-risk demographic for future cardiovascular disease and Type 2 Diabetes. If we can influence this generation to start living healthier now, we can reduce potential future cardiovascular disease in this population group, in addition to its concomitant pressures on the health system and society at large. This project can also potentially reduce societal hypertension in this demographic.We looked at a multi-channel multi-model approaches, including social media influencing, nudging, provoking, as well as interaction and service design approaches. This diverse approach was necessary for a demographic that is traditionally a challenge to influence through textual or academic means.”