Make Your Hospital's Digital Experience Mom-Friendly

When it comes to running the household, it’s often mom who calls the shots. This is especially true for important healthcare decisions, like selecting the right health insurance, picking a primary care physician (PCP) and working with pharmacists to understand the medicines doctors prescribe to family members.

It should come as no surprise that the smartphone revolution has made Mom even smarter, as she takes increased advantage of paperless media to create electronic records of her family. A recent study from maternity site BabyCenter demonstrates that mothers are just beginning to get into the swing of tracking their children’s health statistics on their smartphones: 23 percent admitted that they monitor their children’s nutrition and development electronically, while 40 percent reported that they would switch to digital record keeping if the process were simpler.

In general, consumers shy away from cumbersome websites and apps where mining vital information is time-consuming and difficult, as a survey of popular attitudes toward prostate cancer sites through the Journal of Urology has clarified. Information should be presented succinctly and directly in a fashion that’s above all user-friendly — which means you should think about content placement and navigation, so you understand how decision-makers like mom will access your site.

Keep your information current and accurate, so mothers look to you as a trusted source of the facts they need to manage family health, especially during times of global crisis. As the current Ebola confusion shows, fear and misinformation can easily run rampant, alarming the general public and generating unnecessary fears and false reports. Stay at the top of your game by having your hospital set the standard for factual accuracy. Present it all via a streamlined site or app that doesn’t require a degree in rocket science to operate, and you’ll be golden.