What is Design Thinking? An interactive introduction to the human-centered design process with examples from global health initiatives for training & communication

Proposal:

Introduction: “Design Thinking” is a solutions-based problem solving process that has popular appeal in education as well as global health and development settings. The promise of Design Thinking is to generate more human-centered outcomes and participant satisfaction, however, the practice and implementation of Design Thinking can feel confusing and exclusionary. This highly interactive workshop will introduce and explore the steps of design thinking with the goal of making the framework accessible for the participants to practice and explore how they would apply it in their own context. The workshop will include two examples of Design Thinking projects led by Atlantic Fellows: one that creates engaging communication tools for oral health education in Nigeria, and another that delivers trauma-informed care training to health workers in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Goals &

Objectives:
Participants will:
>Understand the five steps of Design Thinking: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test.
>Apply the five steps in fast-paced and fun exercises: mini-user interviews, turning insights into user specs, concept generation, team decision-making, prototyping and evaluation, and storytelling.
>See an example of how to use design thinking for communication tools.
>See an example of how to use in design thinking health worker training
>Observe, in the two examples, how media & curriculum must be culturally contextualized.
>Feel empowered to explore and apply Design Thinking steps in their own context.

Expertise of the presenters: The five presenters are Atlantic Fellows who work together on Design Thinking projects that have received funding from the Atlantic Institute. Presenters represent a broad range of educational and professional experience from four continents (Asia, Africa, Europe, and the United States) with disciplines including oral health, primary care, mental health, public health, education, research, as well as media, art, and design.
Adekemi Adeniyan (AFHE 2019) uses Design Thinking as a dentist to create educational tools for oral health equity. She is the founder of Dentalcare Foundation, bringing oral healthcare and oral health education to rural communities in Nigeria. Adekemi teaches a course on medical leadership for medical and dental students. http://dentcarefoundation.org/
Www.theanitaseries.com
Eliza Squibb (AFHE 2019) teaches Design Thinking at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and DESIGNxRI, as well as biomimicry design at the Nature Lab at the Rhode Island School of Design. Eliza creates textile designs and communication tools for global health equity. https://d-lab.mit.edu/about/people/eliza-squibb https://www.designxri.com/collaborate/design-challenge/
Ganzamungu Zihindula (AFHESA 2019) is an associate professor of public health epidemiology and health promotion specialist with experience in running trauma-informed care training programs in three countries to help health workers identify and prevent risk factors for mental health. https://tekano.org.za/tekano-fellow/ganzamungu-zihindula/
Ginger Ramirez (AFHE 2017) is an artist and a public health physician who works on health systems strengthening, policy development for mental health, and suicide prevention. Ginger runs a social enterprise that provides creative and complementary therapies for improving mental health care and well-being. https://healthequity.atlanticfellows.org/fellows/caroline-mae-ginger-ramirez-md-mba/
Marx Lwabanya (AFHE 2021) is the Medical Director at Nundu Hospital in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Executive Director & Co-founder of JALI AFYA. Marx is passionate about empowering healthcare workers to address mental health and trauma in order to provide holistic care for patients. https://healthequity.atlanticfellows.org/fellows/marx-itabelo-lwabanya-md-emhl/

Relevance of the topic: We would like participants to understand how Design Thinking can serve as a solutions-based problem-solving process and to feel confident in differentiating Design Thinking from Research, Engineering, or Business problem-solving frameworks. Design Thinking is often misunderstood as a design discipline rather than as a process that is accessible across disciplines and scalable to a variety of contexts. We will place a specific focus on how our examples are culturally contextualized to Nigeria and the Democratic Republic, to demonstrate the importance of local relevancy and ownership for long-term sustainability and effective social change.