Celiac Disease App Design: Choosing Users, Pain Points and a First Release

Design an app for the community of people living with celiac disease. For context, celiac disease is an autoimmune condition in which eating gluten (proteins found in wheat, barley and rye) damages the small intestine; today the only treatment is a strict gluten-free diet for life. Explain what the app should achieve, which members of that community you would build for first, the problems you would solve for them, what goes into the first release, and how you would know it is working. ```hint Map a week, not a feature list Before naming features, walk through an ordinary week for the person you chose and mark every moment where the disease forces them to make a decision or have a conversation. Rank those moments by how often they happen and how much a wrong call costs. ``` ### Clarifying Questions - Who is in the community: only people with a celiac diagnosis, or also parents and partners, people with non-celiac gluten sensitivity, and clinicians such as dietitians? - What does the company want from the app: reach, revenue, health impact, or a mix? - Is the app allowed to give medical or dietary advice, or should it stay away from diagnosis and treatment? - Mobile, web or both, and which country or language first? ### What a Strong Answer Covers - A stated goal for the app, with what success means both for patients and for the company - Groups within the celiac community compared, one chosen, and the reasoning tied to the goal - That group's pain points, ranked by frequency and by the health cost of a wrong answer - Solutions weighed against explicit criteria, a defined first release, and a plan for getting the first users and content into a community product - Success metrics with guardrails, plus risks around health accuracy, liability and sensitive health data ### Follow-up Questions - How would you get the community features off the ground in a city where the app has no users yet? - A user says they became ill after acting on information from the app. How should the product and the team respond? - Would you open the app to people who avoid gluten by choice? What would that gain, and what could it cost the core community?