Karaz Health — Diabetes Mobile App UX Case Study

I designed Karaz, an AI and IoT diabetes app. Live in 500+ clinics across Saudi Arabia. Half of active users hit a healthy GMI within 90 days — peer-reviewed.

Client

Karaz Health

Industry

Healthtech · Diabetes Management

Role

Senior Product Designer · Product Owner

Timeline

16 weeks V1 · ongoing

Live

View live

The Challenge

Saudi Arabia has one of the highest diabetes rates in the world. Patients juggle three to five tools that don't talk to each other. They walk into appointments unable to answer the one question their endocrinologist asks — how much of last week were you in range?

The Solution

I designed Karaz as one app doing five jobs. Daily companion. Clinical record. Marketplace. Community. AI assistant. Held together by a single score — Cherries — that rewards behavior across every surface.

50%

Hit a healthy GMI in 90 days

n=296, peer-reviewed in Digital Health, 2025

500+

Clinics and pharmacies

live across Saudi Arabia · SFDA-licensed

<10s

Time to log a meal

one shortcut from home

01

The Approach

I led design and owned the product. V1 shipped in sixteen weeks with two visual designers and a small engineering team.

First month was listening. Patients, clinicians, pharmacists. Saudi Arabia, not a stand-in market.

The hardest call was the model. Five products in one app means five success metrics fighting for attention. I needed a single primitive to design around. Cherries became that primitive.

02

Key Decisions

01 / 04

Social opens with a composer, not a feed. The first thing patients see is a prompt — what's on your mind today? Posts, recipes, and tips share one surface. Leaderboard up top to reward streaks.

Diabetes management is lonely. The feed had to feel like people doing the same thing.

02 / 04

The marketplace shows products vetted for diabetes, first. 'Recommended' isn't an algorithm — it's a clinical filter. Daily Offers and order history sit beside it, so refilling a CGM uses the same flow as logging a meal.

Live with 500+ partner clinics and pharmacies.

03 / 04

On the profile, Time-in-Range sits at the top. Not followers. Not posts. Below it — today's logged activities, goals a clinician will ask about, and a Glucose Summary comparing before-sleep to after-sleep readings.

Patients walk in with the answer their doctor wants.

04 / 04

Daily Activities is one tap from home — glucose, insulin, meal, hydration, sleep, weight. Ask Karaz AI lives behind the same shortcut for the questions tracking can't answer. The AI doesn't diagnose. It routes.

Time to log a meal dropped under ten seconds.

03

The Outcome

In-app appointments — search by specialty, pick a date, done. Same flow whether it's a telehealth check-in or a yearly endocrinologist visit.

What this means

A single-purpose health app is easy. Five products in one is hard — every section has its own metric. What held Karaz together was the Cherries score. One number. One reason to come back.

  • Move the AI from routing to early triage. Right now it answers; next, it should warn.
  • Build a clinician-side companion app. Half the value is in patient hands; the other half is sitting in PDFs sent by email.
  • Localize the Cherries economy beyond Saudi. The reward design assumes one cultural context — new markets need new tuning.
  • Top Rated on Upwork
  • 100% Job Success
  • $80K+ earned
  • 8+ years

Open to senior remote roles.

Full-time employment or long-term contract. Senior Product Designer or Senior UX Designer. Reach me on LinkedIn or by email.

Or email hey@shahriarsultan.com

Karaz Health — Diabetes Mobile App UX Case Study — I designed Karaz, an AI and IoT diabetes app. Live in 500+ clinics across Saudi Arabia. Half of active users hit a healthy GMI within 90 days — peer-reviewed.