Google Forms is kind of a strange topic for a tech blog, I realize, but hear me out. ;)

Background/Context

I’m volunteering with an organization that helps local senior citizens, and they are piloting a program that sends approved volunteers into older adults’ homes to help support them. While senior citizens in places like long-term care facilities have medical, social, and other supports, those living in the community may not.

An important thing to screen for is whether there is any abuse, neglect, or self-neglect happening. For example, they are getting scammed out of their financial assets, or they are suffering cognitive decline and putting themselves at risk.

The BC Government publishes a decision tree document that explains what to do in various scenarios:

The second page then has lots of additional details, links to various resources, explanations on what to expect and what actions might be taken, etc.

However, this document has a few problems:

1. It uses terminology that someone not in social work, healthcare, and/or legal professions would not necessarily know: “Public Guardian and Trustee (PGT)”, “Community Resource Network (CRN)”

2. There are a number of places on the form that are “fill in the blank” and particularly if you’re volunteering somewhere you don’t normally live you may not have that information at the ready.

3. It’s incredibly information-dense, which may be overwhelming to folks trying to use it in an active situation.

4. There are also some important links on there that are broken. 😬

if you as a volunteer find yourself facing an abuse or neglect situation, the last thing you want to do is spend a whole bunch of time hurriedly looking things up and/or trying to educate yourself on the finer details of the legal system.

Requirements

We want to essentially turn the PDF document into an “app”:

• Simple “quiz” interface: The user is prompted with questions about their situation and is served back the appropriate recommended steps and information for that choice.

• Direct hyperlinks to resources: There are hyperlinks directly to things like online referral forms, the main website of various organizations, etc. so they do not need to be looked up or manually typed in.

• No “fill in the blanks” — the numbers and websites to various things should be looked up in advance and presented to the volunteer in the app.

• Mobile friendly: The app should be easily accessible on a volunteer’s phone so it can be used in the moment. Extra bonus points if the phone numbers are also clickable so they can initiate a phone call immediately.

• Maintainable by people who help senior citizens, NOT techies: Most importantly, the app needs to be maintained by people who are passionate about helping seniors and NOT people who are passionate about technology. (Not to say you can’t be both, but these phone numbers and websites will change from time to time, and an admin within the organization should be able to go in and tweak the words themselves vs. stuck waiting on a developer to do it.)

Choosing a technology

First, start with what technology is the organization already using? This will have a shorter ramp-up time and also increase the likelihood of ongoing maintenance happening, vs. introducing a new tool used only for this purpose that requires its own username and password that might get lost or forgotten as turnover happens.

I knew this particular organization uses the Google suite of products, so I started there, and landed on Google Forms, which:

• is fully functional (if not particularly stunningly gorgeous 🤣) on mobile devices.

• offers “rich text” input which is easily editable and allows for simple formatting (bold, lists, hyperlinks).

• automatically translates a phone number it detects in rich text to a clickable link, e.g. <a href="tel:123-456-7890">123-456-7890</a>.

• “Video” is a type of question, which allows embedding videos from the Public Guardian and Trustee of BC YouTube account to explain the fuller legal context behind the information presented.

• is a solution that is pretty broadly used in the world, so there’s a decent chance that it will be at least somewhat familiar to both volunteers and senior citizens.

Wiring up the “back end”

I think I searched for something like “google form choose your own adventure” and came across this awesome video, by someone talking about using Google forms for this exact purpose (albeit in an educational context):

Here’s how it works:

1. Create “Sections” for each “state” in the logic. One section for the beginning, one section for each “end,” and another section for any other place a question will jump someone to (e.g. a second set of questions to refine choices further).

2. For each “branch” in the logic (if/then), create a multiple choice question.

3. To handle the “go to” logic, click the “three dots” on the lower-right of the question and choose “Go to section based on answer”

   

4. Now the multiple choice question interface will be expanded with a second column where you can specify which section to jump to when the form is submitted and that option is selected.

5. Each section has an “After Section X Go to ….” selector. Choose the final “Thank you” section as the next step for each “end” in the logic.

   

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Practical Example

Here were the Sections of my Google form, one for the initial question and the others for various “ends” (Call 911, Contact Police, Community Resources…)

Here is the multiple choice question asked on Section 1, when the user first loads the form, and how it maps to those sections:

Each of these sections includes the info from the PDF for that logical branch + embedded videos to explain more about the overall legal context. For example:

And finally, here’s what the “user interface” looks like from the perspective of a volunteer who’s visiting with a senior citizen:

If you want to try it out yourself, here’s the link: bit.ly/bc-abuse

(Note: I’m not sure if they will even use this, but it was an interesting puzzle to ponder and required more than 5 browser tabs to reach a solution, hence… blog post. ;-))

Is this your world? Let’s talk!

If your world is helping non-profits and other helpful organizations with “no-code” solutions to their technical problems, with an eye toward accessibility and user experience for both the organization maintenance and their end users, I’d love to hear about what other tools/approaches you’re exploring and/or have come up with, and where you go to talk with others in the same boat! :)

PS: If you are or know who the “Michael Braun”(?) is who created that how-to video, I would love to say thank you!