142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

Annual Meeting Recordings are now available for purchase

309889
Adapting with technology: Using data to drive a user-centered digital experience

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Sunday, November 16, 2014

Lakshmi Grama, MA, MLS , National Cancer Institute, Rockville, MD
Lynn Cheryan, MBA , Sapient Government Services, Arlington, VA
The National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), makes evidence-based cancer information available to the public. NCI’s primary websites, www.cancer.gov and www.cancer.gov/espanol receive nearly three million visits total each month.

Similar to other websites, NCI has seen a substantial increase in visits from mobile devices. From May to December 2011, mobile visits nearly doubled while visits to NCI’s Spanish language site nearly tripled. With such a rapid surge in mobile users, NCI launched its mobile effort to enable users to access its English and Spanish websites wherever and whenever.

User research and analytics have always been valued, so when it came time to develop NCI's mobile strategy, we used a similar approach. The team assessed options for how to deliver content via mobile devices (e.g., mobile site, responsive design, application), and developed a separate mobile site, m.cancer.gov, which launched February 2012.

To develop m.cancer.gov the NCI team conducted initial focus groups and user research, tested concepts and prototypes of mobile websites, and reviewed analytics to identify content that would be most useful in the mobile context. The mobile site expanded the reach of important cancer information. Page views to m.cancer.gov grew by 184% between March 2012 and December 2013.

However, technology does not stand still. The NCI team is now working on the next iteration of mobile by leveraging responsive design principles in the next version of its desktop site. This effort is the result of a careful analysis of its desktop and mobile site.

Learning Areas:

Communication and informatics
Implementation of health education strategies, interventions and programs
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs

Learning Objectives:
Describe important planning and evaluation strategies for making a website accessible across digital devices. Identify methods for deciding which content to make available on a mobile site. Identify content and user interface challenges and how to address them. Understand various ways to develop content that supports a mobile strategy. Demonstrate how new technology accommodates for mobile through responsive design.

Keyword(s): Cancer, Communication Technology

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am an expert information architect and content strategist who specializes in implementing Content Management Systems and content modeling. I am adept at sifting through mountains of content and working with clients to reveal the core information and messages they need to communicate. I have worked with NCI for several years in the capacity of Associate Creative Director User Experience.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.