Lifeline Systems, headquartered in Framingham, Mass., is the leader in the personal emergency response system (PERS) industry. The PERS system enables a subscriber to call for help 24 hours a day, 7 days a week by pressing a call button and speaking to the Lifeline Response Center through a tabletop unit. In the spring of 2005, Lifeline teamed up with the Bentley Design and Usability Center to improve the user manuals that accompany their equipment. The company felt that, although they had been highly successful for 30 years, they could always learn more about how subscribers and caregivers use their products. Working closely together, Lifeline and Bentley employed a number of different research techniques, including shadowing of service representatives, conducting focus groups, and conducting several rounds of usability testing in subscribers' homes. Armed with the research findings and document design guidelines for older consumers, we were able to improve customers' overall experience using the service. Prenovitz and Loring will describe the techniques used in this project and list some key insights gained through our collaboration.

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