Comparison of two Healthcare portals

Basically, two established Healthcare portals were analyzed by the executor of the research project (Ph.D. student Manuela Krauß) to find similarities and different design-related problems. Different design aspects and structural faults were determined and sub-sequently presented.

The information provided on the “Onmeda” portal was partially considered to be too technical and poorly comprehensible for the layman. This resulted in the rating “suffi-cient” [16] for this particular field. In addition to the technical formulations understan-dable only to experts, the assessment rated comprehensibility of text, long sentences, complicated sentences as well as terms that had not been translated nor explained. This analysis was executed by means of special software. [16]

Portal Explanations Subpage with the Subpage with the Onmeda “Heart attack” main menu collapsed main menu expanded Home page with 15 subpages

Figure 01

Healthcare portal Onmeda

The readability of the text is not the focus of Figure 01, but rather the layout, quantity of text and the amount of the different content and information.

Since then comprehensibility of the medical information on the “Onmeda” portal has been thoroughly revised by the gofeminin.de GmbH company. They have made sure the infor-mation given at present is mostly clearly understandable for patients and those interested without any medical background. The situation is different if the number of explanations regarding a clinical pattern is considered. In fact, topic-based information frequently

extends to over 10 additional individual subpages. The text length of the information given is highly recommended to be revised now taking into account its presentation suited for the Internet. [16]

The home page of the Healthcare portal “Onmeda” shows an unclear structure and disor-der regarding the topics offered (the menu functions framed in red are partially unstruc-tured and can only be found after lengthy scrolling). Completely different topics are placed in a disordered manner and without any identifiable hierarchy right on the home page together with pictorial representations. On the other hand, right under the main navi-gation (left picture framed in red), users find games such as “brain trainer” next to

“Sudoku,” self-tests (“migraines test” and “How old is my child”) and some advice on disease prevention next to disease symptoms. [19]

Picture quality is partially moderate, additionally, image details are unsuitable or only slightly meaningful. The green shades of the significant trademark differ from one another when shown on different occurrences.

The texts are not suitable for the Internet (they should be short, precise and to the point).

When doing interactions, the texts that are already colored change their colors again.

Colors here have not been used as a leading function but as a means of the colorful design of this website. The font sizes are too large and predominantly address older age groups, who are usually inexperienced in using the Internet. Only when using the Onmeda infor-mation frequently do users get accustomed to the design deficiencies.

Proof of the lack of a clear structure is that identical contents can be found on diverse subpages and different navigation points. Identical contents are repeatedly displayed (self-test “How old is my child” on the home page under the section self-tests and under the section “My child”) [19], which bloats the whole application significantly.

Other Healthcare portals, such as www.paradisi.de, clearly limit the amount of their in-formation up to a maximum of four Internet pages and show a better structure and design of their thematic areas.

Portal Explanations Subpage with the Subpage with the Paradisi “Heart attack” main menu collapsed main menu

Home page with four subpages expanded

Figure 02

Healthcare portal Paradisi on Heart attack

Paradisi home page (centered) and home page with the main menu expanded (right) [20]

The readability of the text is not the focus of Figure 02, but rather the layout, quantity of text and the amount of the different contents and information.

Healthcare portals like Paradisi.de and others show user-friendly usability partly better than Onmeda.de. Figure 02 shows a clear presentation of several navigation units. How-ever, they are frequently not found among the first pages of the results given by many search engines when typing in the question “What is a heart attack?” Paradisi was not listed until the seventh page of results whereas Netdoktor.de appeared on page 1.

Onmeda.de was listed on page 3. [21] However, users tend to click on the first hits they can get, even though in this case it would take a certain time to get used to the particular structure.

The portal operators of “Onmeda” accord less value to the design-related and structural presentation of the information. The permanent update and optimization (Search Engine Optimizing = SEO), on the other hand, is in the foreground of the portal. The result is that this Healthcare portal will be found right on the first search pages after the users having typed in the respective search terms.

If users are to receive their information queried for on the different Healthcare portals faster, a universal standard is required regarding design, size and positioning of the design elements. This raises the question:

Would nonmedics use Healthcare portals if they were clear, transparent and informative?