UX Study: Possible Fixes

[wlongabaugh]

1. De-emphazise the Collections button, e.g. remove it from upper left, make it smaller, make it a link
2. Change "Exploration" button to say e.g. "Search for Images", "Find Images", "Find your Images"
3. Hide the pie charts by default, and/or make them very small. Collections list MUST be above the fold.
4. Consider lighting up the matching left hand filter selection, and expanding it, when user mouses over the pie chart.
5. Add an explicit "Help" item to prime menu
6. Make the filter reset button more prominent
7. Add the collection tooltips to the collection table rows as well
8. Combine the body part examined and primary site filters into a single UI widget that provides context for what each means
9. Consider having the first item of each hierarchy checked when user first hits the page, to guide them thru the drill-down.
10. Consider replacing the eyeball with an image thumbnail
11. Add parenthetical description to e.g. "Selected Cases" to also say "(e.g. Patients)"
12. Make series level selection the default filter granularity, so the pie charts behave like people expect. Gathering in all series in a study should be an advanced option.
13. Consider adding minimal clinical info ("68 yo white male diagnosed GBM") to case row
14. Consider adding minimal descriptive info to study row ("CT and PET scans")
15. Move the expand filter option from above the list to the bottom (e.g. PDC "More..."). Consider pre-expanding the filters to make them more obvious.
16. Use more description of what "Modalilty" means (e.g.: "Modality (CT, PET, MRI...))"
17. Add one line of collection description to the Collection row on the collections page, with a "more..." to expand it. Nobody hit the "+" sign

[s-paquette]

• Add an explicit "Help" item to prime menu - easy enough to do, we just need a list of what would be in the submenu
• Make the filter reset button more prominent - done in v11/Release 30, visible on dev/test
• Add the collection tooltips to the collection table rows as well - easy to do, will need to possibly adjust tooltip layout to be less columnar
• Add one line of collection description to the Collection row on the collections page, with a "more..." to expand it. Nobody hit the "+" sign - Will require some instrumentation as this is not a default behavior of data tables
• Consider adding minimal descriptive info to study row ("CT and PET scans") - Modality has been requested in another ticket and will likely be done in Release 31; description is already shown but is often blank

[fedorov]

"Start searching by selecting a facet"

[wlongabaugh]

Item (4) in the list touches on the same idea as the PDC directive...if you try interacting with the pie charts, the left hand side gets highlighted to show the relevant filters you should be using.

For me, I would (and did) ignore that note on the PDC page. People don't read things if they have the alternative of clicking on big moving blobs of color.

[fedorov]

Right. Except that people are strange, and people are different.

As an example, the styling of the big blobs of color we have on our portal brings me back to the past century, while PDC blobs look sleek and modern. But it's just me.

[wlongabaugh]

Following on to changes that have already gone out through V12, these are some remaining UI suggestions

1. Shrink the pie charts down in size, wring out all possible vertical white space, provide a selector to hide/minimize (3 charts)/ fully expand the charts. Bottom line is that the Collections list MUST be above the fold.
2. Provide feedback as the user mouses over the pie charts that they mirror the filter selections on the left (e.g. highlight/expand the relevant filter if the use mouses over or clicks a pie chart.
3. Consider moving several main menu items under the new "Help" item as a menu
4. Add the collection tooltips to the collection table rows as well
5. The body part examined and primary site filters have been moved adjacent to each other. Consider tying them together visually, and provide info (e.g. a tooltip) to describe the difference, including how metastasis interacts with primary site.
6. Move the expand filter option from above the list to the bottom (e.g. PDC "More...").
7. Add tooltips to the filter, e.g. to describe what "Modality" mean.
8. Replace the eyeball with either a thumbnail image or text "Open image in viewer"
9. Add one line of collection description to the Collection row on the collections page, with a "more..." to expand it. Nobody hit the "+" sign

A major difficulty was helping users to navigate down the page to get to images, since many were not familiar with the DICOM hierarchy. One aspect of this was not catching on that several levels needed to be traversed. Another was not understanding the difference between case/study/series. Users expressed a desire to immediately see an image somewhere that they are heading for. This is defeated if they need to check boxes to get to an image.

1. Rename or augment (e.g. tooltip) the current description. Say "Patients" instead of "Cases". Say "Diagnostic Office Visit" instead of "Study". Say "Visit Scan" instead of "Series".
2. Consider adding an icon to each category (a head glyph for a case, a stack of rectangles with a thumbnail on top for a series).
3. The rows are currently stocked with numbers that don't provide guidance. Adding minimal clinical info, when available ("68 yo white male diagnosed GBM") to the case row was requested by a user, and would provide important context. The series row would best be devoted to plain-English modality descriptions. Same with study row ("CAT and PET scans, 10/25/88 visit").
4. Show something in the lower hierarchy boxes before something is checked. E.g,. stock them with grayed-out and inactive rows that reflect the results of checking the first item of the box above.
5. We could also reconsider the TCIA accordion approach where each row expands out to reveal content in-place in one table.

Also:

• We still have the problem that checking boxes on the right navigates to the viewer, and does not influence cohort filtering in any way.
• We still create cohorts by selecting on series attributes which then pull in all other series associated with the parent study, which is a complex concept for a new user to understand. Instead, we should make series level selection the default filter granularity, while gathering in all series in a study should be an advanced option.
• We still need to add the ability to add/subtract cases/series/studies from the filter results that define the cohort.

[fedorov]

@wlongabaugh I discussed this with @farahank, and while he really appreciates you taking the initiative and making the effort to improve the portal, he expressed strong preference that any changes to the front page of the IDC portal should be coordinated with SHs before being implemented. Let's try to coordinate such changes going forward.