Human-Centered Design to Enhance Implementation and Impact in Health

Human-centered design (HCD) is an approach that aligns innovation development with the needs of the people and the settings where those innovations will be used. HCD is increasingly being applied across a variety of health domains, most often with the goals of translating research into real-world settings and expanding innovation adoption. This review introduces key HCD concepts, reviews the growth of HCD in public health and its alignment with the complementary field of implementation science, and details four prominent proximal outcomes of design processes: (a) usability, (b) user burden, (c) contextual appropriateness, and (d) engagement. For each outcome, we provide a definition and background, measurement options, and critiques and future directions. We conclude with a series of opportunities and challenges, including an inclusive big tent spanning different design traditions, pathways for enhancing HCD's scientific legitimacy, and explicit promotion of equitable design processes to improve individual, community, and population health.