The National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners (NAPNAP) had worked with DDA Medical on numerous interactive multimedia projects designed to educate both healthcare providers and consumers about important topics in healthcare such as the administration of childhood vaccines and the treatment and management of ADHD. In 2013, NAPNAP developed a concept for a national safety campaign to help consumers understand best practices in regards to the administration, handling, and storage of over-the-counter (OTC) medicines. With a trade show coming up, the project would need to be delivered within a tight, three week timeframe.
The campaign would include a series of custom-designed downloadable handouts aimed at both healthcare providers and consumers (both parents and adolescents) that could easily be obtained either online or printed for patients during in-office visits or for personal use. These downloadable resources would include a small 8.5” x 11” in-office poster and customizable handout for providers to use, in addition to other handouts containing detailed information on OTC medicine safety aimed at adolescents, parents, and caregivers that would also include a guide to reading an OTC medicine label. All downloadable resources would be available in both English and Spanish, and DDA Medical website development services would be used to create a unique online destination with a custom design, customized branding, and links to additional resources on the web to grant access to important information destinations on the topic.
A host of issues needed to be addressed in this safety campaign, which was to be the first in a series of planned public outreach campaigns that the organization wanted to launch. First, the campaign brand name and logo design needed to be flexible enough that it would serve NAPNAP well in reaching out to the public on other important healthcare issues in the future. Second, a consistent visual aesthetic needed to be established between the custom designs of the logo, the downloadable handouts, and the online microsite that would make these resources available. Third, the handout designs would then need to be adjusted to accommodate the lengthier text of the Spanish versions. Perhaps most importantly, however, was that the microsite, which would deliver all this information, needed to have an innovative interactive design that was just as attractive as it was easy to navigate to help appeal to the broadest audience possible.
DDA Medical began its work on the safety campaign by first developing a brand name and tagline to utilize for this safety campaign that could easily be modified for any future safety campaigns that NAPNAP would like to embark upon. Among the numerous options brainstormed and proposed, NAPNAP settled on the phrase “Real Facts, Real Fast: Over-the-Counter Medicine Safety.” DDA Medical then began to generate a plethora of design options for the safety campaign logo, staying sensitive to the fact that it would need to be flexible enough to sustain different color layouts and taglines in addition to being attractive both online and in print.
After the logo was finalized, all handouts were designed according to the aesthetic precedent set by this logo. DDA Medical both shot and manipulated the medicine label photography to fit in perfectly with the client-provided content explaining each section of these labels. All handouts were designed and then subsequently adjusted for the Spanish language versions. DDA Medical then designed a microsite with an innovative navigational system which smoothly scrolls down the page from section to section so users can easily reach information they wish to see, with transitional images placed between each to add even more depth to the interactive visual design. Likewise, DDA Medical animated the safety campaign logo so that when the user clicked upon it, he or she was taken back to the home section of the microsite. Each click of the logo button would cause it to spin around itself in virtual 3D until settling into place, perfectly illustrating the quick and convenient access to healthcare information that this safety campaign represents.
DDA Medical then built out the content of each handout in HTML directly on the website for quick, easy online reference. DDA Medical custom programmed a dynamic PDF generator for the handout to be used by healthcare providers in their practices to introduce patients to important aspects of OTC medicine safety. By entering in the name, address, phone number, website URL, and logo, healthcare providers could generate handouts that helped to increase loyalty to their own practices with this informative, beautifully designed reference sheet. DDA topped off all these developments by designing an 8.5” x 11” flyer and an 8’ x 4’ sign to help promote the launch of the new safety campaign during an upcoming trade show, each featuring custom designs that maintained consistency with the established aesthetics of the logo, microsite, and downloadable resource materials.
After three weeks of intensive work coordinating custom designs across a wide variety of media, from Flash animation to print design to graphic design for the web, including the launch of a new brand to bolster NAPNAP’s marketing outreach and a custom PDF generator to allow healthcare consumers to create their own branded OTC medicine safety reference materials, DDA Medical delivered. NAPNAP received a new microsite, eight custom handout designs, and trade show flyer, and sign designs meant to announce the launch of the campaign. NAPNAP’s enthusiasm for these new materials was demonstrated by their own, unsolicited testimonial: “Thanks again for all your hard work on this site. It really came out great.”