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Your Next Medical Blog Topic: The Flu Shot

Mid-September already? The kids are in school, people are screaming at the refs through their tv screens, and in about five minutes Christmas music will start up in the grocery store. Certain things follow the calendar with uncanny predictability. Like the flu and myths about the flu vaccine.

So why not blog about it?

You’ve heard the myths from your patients:

I don’t get the flu shot because it gives you the flu. Once after a shot I actually got the flu!

The flu shot doesn’t work anyway.

The flu shot is filled with all kinds of horrible ingredients – like formaldehyde!

The flu isn’t such a serious disease – so what if I have the sniffles and a coughf or a couple of days?

This medical blog topic will be easy for you to write about, because you’ve probably addressed these myths over and over with your patients. But to save you a little time, here are resources you can use to address these misconceptions. [Read more…] about Your Next Medical Blog Topic: The Flu Shot

Must We Always ‘Omit Needless Words’?

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences…― William Strunk Jr., The Elements of Style

Many of us writers grew up teething on The Elements of Style and still consider it our bible today. Sometimes, though, it is important to note that the original version of that book was written in 1919– almost a hundred years ago.

Without a doubt, language and writing has changed since then and perhaps more importantly, the medium of writing has expanded in previously unfathomable ways. Could Professor Strunk or E.B. White have imagined such a thing as a blog? [Read more…] about Must We Always ‘Omit Needless Words’?

Create a Better Patient Experience: Declutter Your Medical Website

One of the more popular trends in recent years is decluttering craze. Books and websites are devoted to it. It’s hard to channel surf past the home improvement stations without seeing at a least one show that features decluttering and repurposing your old stuff.

And it’s popular for a reason. We like our stuff. But sometimes that stuff can create more problems than it solves. It prevents us from getting the most benefit from our homes. And sometimes, we even pay for bigger homes than we need just because of all our stuff! [Read more…] about Create a Better Patient Experience: Declutter Your Medical Website

Be a Better Blogger by Breaking These 5 Grammar Rules

Learning English as children growing up in America (or New Zealand, England, or Australia, I imagine) is easy. The words and grammar just seem to flow into our ears and fall out of our mouths. We don’t think about it much. Learning English formally in school, though, is another story.

Suddenly we have all these terms and rules to learn that make this native tongue, that we thought we had down, very confusing. But we struggle through, and we do learn the rules, whether they make sense to us or not. And as adults, we diligently use them in our writing in the hopes that we don’t come across as idiots.

Have you noticed though, that the way we communicate formally (whether spoken or written) has gotten more casual over the last few decades, and a lot of people seem to be ignoring many of these rules? In fact, in some media outlets, a blog for example, a more rule-based formal style can come off as stodgy and pretentious. [Read more…] about Be a Better Blogger by Breaking These 5 Grammar Rules

Cropping Images for Your Medical Website

Choosing images for your medical website can be a time-consuming task. Sometimes you run across the an image that is perfect except for one little thing. Often, you can resolve that “little thing” with the simple act of cropping the image.

Reasons to Crop

You can crop your image to improve its composition or get rid of distractions in the background. If you are using photos from Flickr Creative Commons, this will probably be very important. Professional stock photos are staged and composed from the get go. But photos from Flickr aren’t necessarily snapped with your particular use in mind, so cropping can be really handy. [Read more…] about Cropping Images for Your Medical Website

How I use Baby Steps to take the Pain out of Writing

For me, writing can be painful and easy to procrastinate. I have chosen to do it for a living though because once I get over the hump, I can fall into it and time stops for me. And I love having written.

Sometimes I just loath having something in front of me that I need to write. Like getting a kid to eat liver and onions, I need external structures (like bribery) and trickery to get me to do it. And it’s how I make a living, so that can be a problem. I do manage to do it, though, by employing a number of strategies I have picked up over the years. [Read more…] about How I use Baby Steps to take the Pain out of Writing