After some research and considering different aspects of the several themes I was interested in, I decided to focus on the health topic. It’s an area where I believe that communication design can be an important tool to improve the relation between staff and patients, to make the explanation of some diseases understandable, to inform about prevention…
Now I’m thinking to research what have been done so far. I know that might be a large number of good examples, but I think that there is still a lot to be done. At least in my country. I’ll also continue to read about information design.
Since I won’t be present on Thursday, it would be nice to have some feedback and if you know some references, tips that could help me, I will be very grateful :)Rita :
Area of interest > Information design, Health
Health communication issues
Area of research > Workshop and books dealing with information design, Internet-based research of what have been done so far in this area
Hi Rita
ReplyDeleteHealth is certainly an important topic and, if the NHS is typical of other countries, a very big employer, so an interesting area to choose. I would really need a bit more information about the focus of your interest - is it hospitals, doctors' surgeries, schools? Is it preventative information or for people who have been diagnosed? Not sure?
I don't know about this subject and can't recommend anything off hand but from an initial on-line search (5 mins) I came up with a book that sounded interesting UK HEALTHCARE DESIGN REVIEW. Trouble is, can't find a library which has it - we don't, the British Library doesn't. So not helpful there....but research is a lot about this....trying and getting stuck and going somewhere else.
Then I turned to shelf categories in the library and under the advanced search, searched for Information Design + Health. Most of the books that came up were about architecture, but one I thought might give you some leads because inspite of the title it seemed to be about more than architecture.
Sustainable healthcare architecture / Robin Guenther, Gail Vittori.
Author:Guenther, Robin.
Published:Hoboken, N.J. : John Wiley & Sons, c2008.
ISBN:9780471784043 (cloth : alk. paper)
If I was to continue I would then look into Information Design and see if I could track anything that way. I would be looking not only for books but also for references to other books via their bibliographies.
Then, I would think about other university libraries, and particularly University College London (UCL) as they have a big medical section and therefore would have more books. You are allowed to use these libraries and I would go there and ask the librarians.
Finally, a thought, the Welcome Collection has a library and they might have some ideas Library opening hours
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday10.00-18.00
Thursday10.00-20.00
Saturday10.00-16.00
Wellcome Collection
183 Euston Road
London NW1 2BE
I'm writing all this because I hope it will be helpful to you but also to communicate to everyone that it is really a matter of trial and error, thinking 'outside the box' sometime, meeting dead ends and not being afraid to ask. People love to help!
I hope the course is useful on Thursday. Thanks for uploading your work. I will amend our list to include your area of interest.
Victoria
Thanks for all the suggestions!
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure about exactly it will be. I know that is a broad theme, but I feel that I have to know a bit more about it and what has been done so far.
Sorry, I'm not able to specify so much in a week, from 6 different themes to a focused subject in one of them.
I know that the Design Council have some initiatives related with health:
http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/our-work/challenges/Health/
IDEO also have some:
http://www.ideo.com/expertise/health/
It's not really related with information design, but it's a start.
I also remember from Michael Wolff's lecture last term, that he was doing something in this field. I wonder if it is possible to ask him some advice...
Thanks again.
Rita