by Edward Berg

Created on: August 01, 2008   Last Updated: May 26, 2011

Today its much more likely that someone will use the internet to find out information about their local hospital than the ordinary phone book. As the internet becomes a principal source of information for patient decision making, it is more critical than ever before for hospitals to build user-friendly sites where information is easily found and accessible. Features on a website may determine a patient's choice in hospitals thereby making it crucial for high-quality content and organization on hospital websites.

Hospital websites have been utilizing a variety of new and innovative features to enhance the online experience of users. Among the technologically savvy and innovative hospital websites are those from Johns Hopkins Hospital, the Mayo Clinic, Mt. Sinai Medical Center, Georgetown University Hospital, and University of Chicago Medical Center.

The Johns Hopkins Hospital website provides informative podcasts on a variety of medical procedures, information, and developments. These podcasts include the Johns Hopkins Medicine News Roundup, Gastroenterology, Neurology, and Johns Hopkins Health Newsfeed. For more information visit http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org.

The Mayo Clinic website features a slide show visual guide to a variety of health related topics. The slide show database is an informative section which provides multiple slides on each topic. Slide shows provide users with the ability to learn to identify certain health related symptoms, exercises, safety tips, medical procedures, learn anatomy, and provide health living tips. For more information visit http://www.mayoclinic.com.

The Mt. Sinai Medical Center website features disease and condition databases in its patient care section for each of the programs shown. The information featured in these databases provides its users with a valuable source of information on the definition, causes, risks, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of certain diseases and conditions. For more information visit http://www.mountsinai.org/Patient%20Care.

The Georgetown University Hospital website utilizes its website to make documents available online available in Adobe Acrobat format. Among these online documents available are advanced directives documents and a list of informative websites beneath the document link. For more information visit http://www.georgetownuniversityhospital.org/body.cfm ?id=555640.

The University of Chicago Medical Center allows for patients to create CarePage personal websites where family members and friends can utilize features to post and receive news updates, messages, share information about the patient, post photos, and order gifts or flowers by accessing the personalized patient web page. For more information visit http://www.carepages.com/uchospitals.

As the internet continues to grow in both complexity and popularity, hospitals must be able to keep up with the latest trends and features to satisfy the demanding requirements of its users. Features on a website may add to the attractiveness of the hospital to a patient and can be the critical decision maker on which hospital to choose. Technologically savvy yet simplistic user-friendly websites tend to attract the greatest appeal. The webpage features offered at these five hospitals are but small ways that the hospitals may enhance the experiences of its potential patients.

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