Graphic Design in Healthcare: Need and fulfillment

In healthcare illustrations and design, there are several individuals who gave their contributions. To my knowledge, Leonardo da Vinci was the first genius who contributed it with his anatomical illustrations in the pre-digitalization era. The new age design is bringing a revolution of all kinds. Things are getting simpler like never before as researchers, designers/illustrators are working hard to make it accessible and understandable for each one of us by adopting various concepts of Design Thinking.
.
Nowadays, as health organizations are more focused on outreach and other marketing programs, suitable graphics and illustrations enable them to communicate effectively with the targeted audience and convey the exact message. It is also a fact that the demand is so huge but the quality of the graphics it’s getting fulfilled with is not that great. The complex design or poorly shaped elements make it worse to be understood by the people. Random selection of colors is becoming one more addition to the miscommunication. Healthcare organizations need to be very specific about the message that they are trying to convey.
.
Within the span of my design career, I’ve worked with a dozen of organizations out of which 5-6 were among healthcare ranging from micro to substantial market players. Apart from that, I study the design literature and observe the real market a lot. Frequently, I go to the superstores and malls just to get to know the market requirements in terms of design and branding. Many healthcare organizations are really bad at design consistency. I often see many of them and at times, I feel that the health/medical industry is still untouched by the appropriate graphic design. I’d rather say that they are more focused on marketing that has an improper message. It’s true even for the biggest players in the industry today.
.
A couple of market players have flooded their creativity into their product designs and made very fancy designs for themselves. But, in reality, the healthcare industry demands simplicity and impact altogether. Sometimes, just the Alignments and positions of the objects fulfill the purpose.
.
They should know what people may and may not understand. Because one miscommunication could be life-threatening. So, it is obvious thing for every healthcare organization to upgrade itself with quality graphics and illustrations. It is also the responsibility of graphic designers and illustrators to design and illustrate with responsibility and high design standards, especially when working on healthcare projects. Every time I make any mistake in such design projects and realize it later in the quest, as a responsible designer, I should try to correct myself even if the project owners are okay with that mistake. No matter even if the project has been closed.