Live client product · Designed & built solo
Elite Exams LLC: Medical evidence, designedfor the people who served.
Private Nexus letters and DBQ medical exams for U.S. veterans in Dayton, Reno and Carson City, Nevada. I built the whole digital ecosystem: brand, accessible design system, a HIPAA-conscious web platform, and a growth strategy with zero ad spend.
- Role
- Creative Director, Product Designer & Web Developer (solo)
- Client
- Marissa Delgadillo, Board-Certified Nurse Practitioner, founder
- Stack
- Next.js 16 (App Router), TypeScript, Tailwind CSS v4, shadcn/ui, Jotform Health
- Scope
- Brand, design system, UX, front-end development, marketing strategy
Overview
At a glance
- Challenge
- Veterans face dense bureaucracy and confusing interfaces, and the private exam market was fragmented: competitors offered only virtual document reviews or only mental-health evaluations.
- What I built
- The whole digital ecosystem, solo: a trauma-informed brand, a WCAG 2.1 AA design system, a HIPAA-conscious Next.js platform with Jotform Health intake, and a growth strategy with zero ad spend.
- Outcome
- Live at eliteexamsllc.com, offering Nexus letters and in-person DBQ exams to veterans in Dayton, Reno and Carson City, Nevada.
- Role
- Creative Director, Product Designer & Web Developer
- Team
- Solo, with full creative direction
- Audience
- U.S. veterans, mostly 50+
- Service area
- Dayton, Reno & Carson City, NV
The problem
What wasn't working
Filing for VA disability benefits means dense bureaucracy and confusing interfaces, often at a stressful moment. Veterans looking for private medical evidence found a fragmented market: some providers offered only virtual document reviews, others only mental-health evaluations.
Elite Exams fills that gap with both Nexus letters and in-person DBQ exams. Its audience is mostly veterans over 50, so the product had to deliver three things at once: clinical authority, psychological safety, and touchpoints that are genuinely accessible.
The gap
Competitors offered either virtual document reviews or mental-health evaluations. Elite Exams offers Nexus letters and in-person DBQ exams, for an audience that needs to feel safe, not sold to.
The Process
Brand & design system
Trauma-informed and military-inspired, without the clichés
The palette borrows from service without leaning on camouflage or flags. Navy carries trust, olive is a quiet secondary accent, gold is saved for the moments that matter, and crimson appears only on destructive or warning actions.
Instead of sterile medical stock photography, the site uses custom “Memphis Corporate” vector illustrations: warm and human rather than clinical.
- Navy#1F3A93
Primary. Trust and authority: headers, primary buttons, section bands.
White text 10.1:1 · AAA
- Olive#4B5320
Secondary accent. A military reference without the camouflage clichés.
White text 8.2:1 · AAA
- Gold#FFD700
Highlights only: calls to action, rules and focus states, always on navy.
On navy 7.2:1 · AAA. On white 1.4:1, never used
- Crimson#B3261EDestructive only
Reserved for destructive and warning actions. Nothing else.
White text 6.5:1 · AA
The rule that keeps gold honest
Accessibility as the baseline
WCAG 2.1 AA, designed for veterans over 50
Many of the people this site serves are over 50, and some live with motor tremors. Every interactive element is at least 44×44px, text meets high-contrast ratios, controls carry clear ARIA labels, and the whole flow works with a screen reader.
Try it
Where does a fingertip actually land?
24 × 24 px
Too small
One fingertip covers all three buttons. With a tremor, “Book” becomes “Call”.
44 × 44 px
The Elite Exams minimum
Each target holds a whole fingertip, with room to spare between them.
Measured contrast, brand pairs
- White on navy10.1:1AAA
- Gold on navy7.2:1AAA
- White on olive8.2:1AAA
- Navy on white10.1:1AAA
- White on crimson6.5:1AA
This case study follows the same rules: every text color on this page passes AA, and every animation switches off or becomes a simple fade when your device asks for reduced motion.
Architecture & trust
HIPAA-conscious by design
The platform runs on the Next.js App Router. Standard contact forms were replaced with Jotform Health on its HIPAA GOLD tier, so intake data is handled by a platform built for it, from the first field to storage.
Following one intake through the system…
“Not a medical emergency” banner
Every page opens by telling visitors to call 911 in an emergency, and that the site handles administrative scheduling only.
Data minimization
Protected health information stays out of plain email. Intake goes through Jotform Health instead.
Notice of Privacy Practices
A Notice of Privacy Practices framework sets out how health information is used and protected.
Growth · $0 ad spend
Be the answer where veterans and their advocates already look.
No paid search budget. Instead: show up in local results, earn referrals from the people veterans already trust, and teach before selling.
Structured data tells search engines exactly what the clinic is and where it serves, so each city's Business Profile and the site reinforce each other.
- 01
Local SEO
Google Business Profiles for Dayton, Reno and Carson City, backed by MedicalClinic JSON-LD in the Next.js layout.
- 02
B2B referral loops
LinkedIn outreach to Veteran Service Officers and VA disability attorneys, positioning Elite Exams as their medical back office.
- 03
Short-form education
Short videos that answer the long-tail questions veterans already search for.
- 04
Lead magnet
The “High-Intent Evidence Audit”: a reason for veterans who are still deciding to start a conversation.
- 05
Geofenced Meta campaign
Northern Nevada only and focused on physical claims, written in a “Clinical Authority” copy framework to stay inside ad policy.
AI-accelerated, still hand-made
How one person covered brand, design, code and marketing
AI tools kept the work moving; the decisions, the design, and the accessibility calls stayed mine.
Cursor
Scaffolding, debugging, and WCAG checks while building.
Gemini + custom Gems
Ideation, copy drafts, and competitive synthesis.
NotebookLM
Project knowledge base: briefs, design tokens, audience demographics.
The live product
Shipped, and serving veterans today.
From the emergency notice in the header to the intake form at the end, every screen is built for someone who may be anxious, tired of paperwork, and reading on a phone.
Services, decoded
A plain-language helper answers the first question every veteran has: do I need a Nexus letter or a DBQ?
Secure intake
Intake runs through Jotform Health's HIPAA GOLD tier instead of a standard form, so PHI never lands in an inbox.
Accessibility, on the record
A public accessibility statement commits the clinic to WCAG, written with veterans and older adults in mind.
See it working: the site is live at eliteexamsllc.com.
Visit live site(opens in a new tab)Retrospective
Looking back
Elite Exams is a live product shipped end to end by one person: brand, design system, platform and growth strategy. Designing for veterans meant treating accessibility and trust as the foundation, not as features added at the end.
What's next
- 01Personalized medical evidence briefing videos.
- 02A physician-to-physician (P2P) documentation toolkit.
Constraints that shaped the design
- HIPAA: anything that touches health information goes through HIPAA-tier tools, never plain email or a standard form.
- An audience mostly over 50: large type, high contrast and 44px targets were requirements, not polish.
- A $0 ad budget: growth had to come from local search, referrals and education.
- Health ad policies: the Meta campaign's copy follows a “Clinical Authority” framework to stay within them.