Creating a 0-1 Clinical Information Management System
AltaMed's clinic operations ran on a fragmented spreadsheet system that caused real errors during live patient calls. This project replaced it with a centralized, staff-designed internal platform — built from the back-stage out.
Client
AltaMed
Role
Systems Design
Year
AltaMed serves more than 300,000 patients across Southern California, yet one of their most critical operational systems (an internal spreadsheet used to manage clinic information) was unreliable, outdated, and difficult to maintain.
I led the end-to-end UX research and product design of a new Clinical Information Management System that transformed a messy, error-prone workflow into a scalable, intuitive internal tool that supports staff in delivering safer, faster, and more consistent patient care.
Quick stats
100+ clinic locations Methods: Stakeholder interviews, service mapping, 0-to-1 product design, prototyping Users: Operations staff, Patient Service Center agents, IT teams
The Challenge
The problem wasn't a single screen, it was the friction between people, touchpoints, and decisions.
The existing system relied on a fragmented spreadsheet that created inconsistent and outdated information, a high risk of manual error, difficulty locating and updating operational data, and inefficient workflows for staff supporting patient inquiries in real time.
These weren't just internal productivity problems. They surfaced directly in patient-facing moments — when a Patient Service Center agent answered a call with information that was simply wrong.
Where the breakdowns actually happened
Stakeholder interviews · Operations owners and Patient Service Center agents surfaced where the spreadsheet was failing them in real time.
Service mapping · Tracing how clinic data moved from entry to the point of a live patient call.
From isolated moments to a shared service map
The map connected how data was entered, how it moved through operations, and how it ultimately reached a PSC agent mid-call. Seeing it laid out as one system — rather than as separate complaints from separate teams — made clear that small frictions in data entry were compounding into real service failures by the time they reached a patient.
Staff were already solving around the system.
Operations teams had built their own workarounds — side notes, personal trackers, verbal handoffs — to compensate for what the spreadsheet couldn't do. Those workarounds were the clearest signal of what the real system needed.
The breakdown lived in the handoffs.
The most critical failures weren't within any single screen or spreadsheet tab — they happened in the gaps between who entered data, who maintained it, and who needed it during a live call.
Once the system was visible, priorities became obvious.
Mapping the full data flow — not just the interface — let the team agree quickly on what mattered most: a single source of truth, structured entry, and real-time accuracy.
The Solution
I led discovery and workflow analysis to understand how staff interacted with the tool and where breakdowns occurred. Based on insights, I designed a centralized interface that:
simplified editing and viewing of clinic information
standardized data entry to improve consistency
supported flexible scheduling scenarios (holidays, breaks, service variations)
provided a clearer operational overview for staff
The solution focused on reducing cognitive load while ensuring the system could scale with AltaMed’s growth.
The result
The new tool established a more reliable source of truth for clinic operations, reducing manual inefficiencies and improving information accessibility for staff. By replacing fragmented spreadsheets with a structured interface, the system supported more confident decision-making and laid the groundwork for continued feature expansion. Complete with functionality to:
Manage services from corporate to clinic level
Manage unique clinic hours
Manage location information
User Management
The platform replaced a system where the same data lived in two places and rarely matched. By consolidating into one structured source of truth, PSC agents now reference a single reliable system during live patient calls — eliminating the exact failure point that originally drove this project. The system is in active testing with operations and PSC teams ahead of full rollout, with version control and audit history built in to support long-term data integrity as AltaMed continues to grow.
What this project reinforced
Strong service design often starts by slowing down enough to see the full system before touching any interface. The most valuable work on this project wasn't adding functionality — it was helping the team agree on what could be made simpler, more structured, and more human. Understanding how data moved from an operations spreadsheet to a PSC agent's screen during a live call was the real design challenge. The interface came after.
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