Readings for Oct 6

Visual hierarchy is important to any reader. If you're making something that requires concentration and is formal, one must have an easy to read hierarchy of what needs to be filled out.

With a form like the patient intake form, it should be readily available for anyone to fill out. Some people come into a hospital and are stressed out or distraught and this form needs to be incredibly easy to read and figure out. I've been to hospitals where I had to fill out pages and pages of paperwork and it wasn't always easy to read if I was checking the right box (especially when giving blood. I ALWAYS check at least one wrong box).

This form should also be quick to finish so the paperwork turnaround can be quick so the patient's loved one can get back to them.


I'm a huge fan of "fill in the blank" kind of forms because they leave no room for error. If you clearly have No [ ], Yes[ ], I don't know [ ], you clearly know which box you should be checking for "I don't know." The 4Cs are now in my vocabulary as four main foci for making this form. If I'm clear and concise, the patient won't have any problem answering these prompts, but clever may be harder as there is no room for error in a written form. Co-Operative is useable when giving the patient plenty of white space so they a.) have plenty of space to write their symptoms etc and 2) don't write in the wrong spot.


With this form, I feel that it's very important that I left-justify the beginning of a new topic. This allows the patient to understand better what they're meant to write in the blanks.

I don't think it's very necessary to use color, other than a possible gray bar at the top and bottom to put the unnecessary information in which states where the hospital is and/or the name of the form.

Note: I found it ironic that they recommend you don't use serif fonts (number 4, 10 election design guidelines) but the entire Web page is in Serif... probably Times New Roman...


Contrast, Balance, Proportion, Rhythm, Harmony, Movement, Unity. These terms remind me so much of music. One has to have a balance of sounds so the song will be clear to the listener, the song must also have movement and contrast from what was previously done, so the listener won't get bored. These also all make so much sense in terms of making a successful layout since you need to have every aspect of these terms in order to allow a person to use the design to it's greatest ability.