Healthydebate.ca is a vibrant, expertly curated, community-driven WordPress website aimed at fomenting active discussions by community leaders, activists, healthcare professionals, and engaged members of the Canadian public.
The scope is healthcare in Canada, and the topics are broad and varied. Zeitguys was initially engaged to bring this social media project from the pages of the research grant to full online reality in 2010, and then again in 2015 for the second iteration which saw a new healthcare stories component, Faces of Healthcare, incorporated into the otherwise comprehensive collection of socially engaging articles .
Our deliverables included:
- Information architecture (IA) and UX (User Experience) design
- Visual design and WordPress theme customization
- Plugin research, implementation and customization
- Custom WordPress development, plugin and widget creation
- Project management and testing
- Documentation and end-user WordPress training
To facilitate the most effective presentation of the dynamic healthydebate article ‘grid’ –for mobile as well as desktop screens– custom features were added to the administrative back end. These custom WordPress admin features allow authors to customize the short excerpt that is used to feature each article, depending on the cell size used to display it at that time. For example, when an article was new, it would be showcased in a larger cell, and after time it would be displayed in a smaller placement. Each of these require different content lengths to remain readable.
To boot, we also provided a “boosting” content-management feature that allows the site admin personnel to promote any article to a top ‘feature’ placement, should its subject matter become noteworthy at a later date. Staff then are able to be ‘news editors’ or curators of timely content.
Each type of content is given a slightly different design layout, to help visitors easily identify the type of content they are looking at. Patient stories (top) for instance, present with a more compelling personal photo and smaller blocks of content
Articles and other post types include their own relevant collection of ‘meta’ data, such as date and author(s)