Piece: Rediscover the lost piece of you
Mental health support for leukaemia patients at AUMC
Presenting Piece, a simple way of connecting to people on a deeper level. Patients are often not motivated to get out of bed and I believe that a single step goes a long way. With piece, I motivate patients to try and get out of bed nearly everyday and allow them to express themself on a deeper level. Patients are urged to play and have some colour in their lives everyday and rediscover a piece of themselves.
Piece consists of a series of carefully designed magnetic pieces and a daily challenge module. The daily challenge module assigns each patient a challenge everyday which the patients complete using the magnetic pieces.
As a result of testing, I believe that the creations of these daily challenges could be the basis for conversation between the patient and their families, healthcare staff and mental health professionals. People use this mode of expression to talk about the ways they look at life and the world around them. This forms the basis for deep connections and meaningful conversations that span above and beyond one’s illness.
Amsterdam University Medical Center
Project Client
The Department of Hematology at the Amsterdam UMC is nationally and internationally known as a leading center with outstanding academic care bringing innovative therapy and early phase trials to leukaemia patients.
Background and Context
The cancer journey and the root of the problem
The journey through cancer is an arduous one. With many long stays at the hospital and several weeks of being indoors, it can sometimes start to feel like a prison. With this constricted feeling, it is essential for a patient to find an escape, find an identity beyond the cancer and find a way to express this identity.
With early research into the meaning of cancer and the identity of leukaemia, it became evident that patients immediately feel a sense of dread, suffering and even death. They find it difficult to estrange themselves from the cancer and often the environment of the hospital does not help with these feelings. The effects of this confinement, lack of stimulation and lack of connectedness can be seen with the patients.
With all this, it was clear to me that the mental health of the patients is a high priority. Mentally and emotionally helping the patients could ultimately have a positive effect on their physical well being as well.
The Journey through Cancer
Lets zoom out and look at cancer and the identity associated with it. As we can see, cancer is still most commonly associated with themes such as death and suffering. So, today, when a patient walks into a hospital for a rather minor ailment and learns they have leukaemia, their world is turned upside down. They understandably beyond shocked and begin to confront their mortality. What does this all mean for patients? They think and feel sick and like there is no escape. Their life has completely changed all of a sudden.
A Patient's Perspective
The stay at the hospital can cause a patient to lose their sense of self. The walls are barren and lifeless. They are seen as nothing but a patient. They are not allowed to leave the hospital and they have no freedom, autonomy or purpose. All of this can have adverse mental effects on a patient who is already physically in treatment, and just had a sudden shock.
“Its just like a prison and they even allow prisoners to roam in the open air”
- Patient at AUMC
The Vision
“To give patients the motivation to get out of bed regularly, through activities that bring their focus to the 'now’.”
The statement above has 3 main components: firstly, ‘the motivation to get out of bed regularly’. Although this is a very small amount of physical activity, it leads back to the fact that small incremental changes can have large impacts. Additionally, the component of regularity sets in a certain rhythm and habit that I believe can have a large positive impact on the patient.
Secondly, ‘activities’, this aims at giving patients something to do. Patients have mentioned that they are not stimulated mentally at the hospital and these activities aim to give patients that respite.
Finally, ‘focus on the now’ comes from wanting to give the patients a mental escape. Through a series of experiments, I noticed that some mentally stimulating activities can briefly allow people to be very present and immersed in the activity. This brings us back to our childhood. Children rarely live in the past or future, to them it is about the ‘now’.
Ideation and Concept direction
How?
Final Concept
Piece: Rediscover the lost Piece of you
Piece consists of a series of carefully designed magnetic pieces and a daily challenge module. This daily challenge module takes the form of a storage box that can store the magnetic pieces. The box and the pieces stick to the magnetic boards present in the patient rooms. On being admitted into the hospital, every patient receives one set. This set stays with the patient to avoid any sterilization issues and it stays with the patient to provide the patient a sense of ownership over what they create.
Every morning, the patient receives a new daily challenge. This could be curated by the mental health professional, the patient’s family or be a default preset available. A light on the side of the box lights up to alert the patient of the new challenge. The patient gets out of bed and opens a secret door to reveal their challenge and completes it using the pieces present. This then stays up on their board. This serves as a conversation starter for family, healthcare staff or mental health professionals.
The patterns created often carry a certain significance to the patients and this is a message they want to share. This gives them the opportunity to share that message. Every challenge is free and has no right or wrong answers. It could take a patient anywhere from 15-30 minutes to complete. It is entirely up to their interpretation. This means that for those 15-30 minutes everyday, the patient is engrossed in an activity that takes them away from the thoughts of the hospital.
The box is made of plastic but given a wood finish, to be reminiscent of childhood memories with the wooden boxes that would be placed near boards. It has a slot for a light and a small sliding door. It houses the electronics responsible for displaying the daily challenge and holds the pieces when they are not in use. The back of the box is magnetic and will be used to hold it up on the patient’s magnetic board.The light present glows when a challenge is ready. On testing, the patient mentioned that they would like to know somehow in an obvious way if a new challenge was ready for them. The light stays on till the patient accesses the challenge. The light is not very bright or large. On testing, it was observed that patients do not feel the energy to do the challenge everyday at the same time. Having the light be too large can get in the way of them taking rest and be overstimulating.The patient slides a small door to reveal the challenge to themselves. This is in order to give that interaction a sense of play. The challenge is personal to them, it is selected for them by a mental health expert or a family member so the door also re-emphasises that personal nature.
Finally, the challenges tested so far are of 2 different variations. The first is to give the patient a word and ask them to represent it in their own way. For instance, “represent the word GROW in your own way”. This allows patients to explore specific themes and express their feelings on them. The next is to pose restrictions by asking patients to leave out a few pieces. For instance, “Make something using only the PURPLE pieces” or make something using only the BLOCK shaped pieces”. These leave more room for free thinking and expression, which are more likely to bring out present thoughts and feelings that a patient is experiencing.
More details
What makes Piece, Piece?
Each piece is made of plastic with a magnet at the back in order to stick to the patient’s magnetic board at the hospital. The pieces are slightly rounded to give them more of an organic feel. Organic shapes are known to promote creativity, motivate people more and lend themselves more to expression. There are a total of 28 pieces present. This number is chosen through experiments to see how many pieces were necessary and in what composition. It is done to promote creativity through possibilities but not be overwhelming.
The pieces are easy to hold in the palm and quite light weight as well weighing in at a few grams per piece.
The colours of the pieces are chosen carefully to make sure that it is not childish. No primary colours are employed as these are usually correlated with children’s toys. The colours are also chosen to avoid any gender stereotypes. Colours like pink are usually associated with female products and too many dark shades are associated with male products. This avoids either of those stereotypes, making it more open.
Bringing the vision to life
Testing
Tests were conducted with patients at AUMC
Challenge: Represent the word ‘Grow’ in your own way
Participant 1
“I make a tree and a butterfly, what represent grow for me. They are both changing.”
Participant 2
“A mandala
In the centre movement, dynamic
Around the centre a ring of different forms, standing for unique and different energies
In the outer circle some different manifestations
For me that represents how life works”
As a result of testing, I believe that the creations of these daily challenges could be the basis for conversation between the patient and their families, healthcare staff and mental health professionals. People use this mode of expression to talk about the ways they look at life and the world around them. This forms the basis for deep connections and meaningful conversations that span above and beyond one’s illness.