Before/After: How Helix Health Swapped Tabs for Tasks and Increased Engagement

Tech · 6 min read

Helix Health's clinician-facing app originally used a traditional tabbed layout: Vitals, Meds, Notes, Labs, and History. Clinicians complained the interface encouraged context switching and made it hard to track what needed action. In their redesign, product and UX teams reoriented the UI around prioritized tasks — things that required clinician intervention — surfaced by patient risk and timeline urgency.

The new layout replaces top-level tabs with a chronological task list and a compact patient snapshot. Tasks are grouped into Today, Soon, and Alerts and can be snoozed or assigned. Relevant data — last vitals, outstanding labs, and medication interactions — are shown inline in task detail to avoid switching screens. Designers focused on reducing friction for common clinical flows like medication reconciliation and lab follow-ups.

Pilot results in two clinics showed average time per patient decreased by 18%, and follow-up action completion increased by 22% in the first month. Clinicians reported fewer interruptions and a stronger sense of situational awareness. The Helix Health case demonstrates that reframing interfaces around user goals (tasks) instead of data categories (tabs) can materially change behavior and outcomes.