Redesign: Maine Health Access Foundation advances health care reform in Maine
July 13th, 2010
A few weeks ago Pemaquid launched a new Web site for the Maine Health Access Foundation (MeHAF). MeHAF advances its mission through three strategic priorities: advancing health care reform in Maine; promoting patient and family-centered care; and strengthening Maine’s health care safety net.
The goal of our redesign project was to help give MeHAF the online tools needed to share knowledge, publicize the work of its grant recipients and strengthen its position as a thought leader on health care issues in Maine.
When MeHAF approached Pemaquid in January of this year, their Web site was not helping them advance their strategy. For several years they had been using a rigid, hard-to-use content management system that had been built using proprietary programming on an ASP.net platform. The system was balky and hard to adjust to meet changing needs. MeHAF staff had a tough time understanding how to manage the CMS, let alone how to use it to communicate quickly and effectively online.
Pemaquid responded by developing a custom version of our Pemaquid Content Manager, built atop the Django framework. We were able to quickly architect a solution that allowed MeHAF to preserve and migrate all the data from their existing site. At the same time, we were able to dramatically improve their ability to self-publish content on the site. Their page templates are much more flexible and search-engine-friendly, so over time we hope to see their search positioning (already relatively good for relevant topics) improve.
With the new Content Manager in place, MeHAF can update every page on their site – and create new ones – in a way that is easy to manage and is search-engine friendly. They can even easily control naming conventions (i.e. “mysite.com/mysection/mypage”). They can update news and events, and can update the contents of a custom library of Resources.
With a little help from graphic artist Arielle Walrath we updated the look and feel of the site to match design elements from their most recent annual report, designed by Portland agency Pennisi & Lamare.
As with all Pemaquid sites, MeHAF.org is built with bulletproof, cross-browser compatible CSS and xHTML and is structured so it’s easily accessible to folks with visual and physical impediments and who use assistive devices to browse the Web.
The solid base we’ve established also puts MeHAF in position to incorporate linkages to their nascent social networking system, and Django’s Open Source framework will allow us to build an online community for sharing health information through an onsite social network/forum, should MeHAF decide to move in that direction.
Whatever they decide to do next and however they choose to approach it online, the Pemaquid Content Manager will give them a platform that allows their site to easily grow and change along with their online communications objectives.
I’ve probably thanked Rob and his staff a hundred times at least, but I’m not sure I can thank them enough for the product they provided for MeHAF. Before making the switch to Django, we struggled to do very basic things with the ease you would expect. Simple tasks like uploading files were cumbersome and time consuming, and the results of our work were often inconsistent. Django has improved our efficiency dramatically, and we’re so excited for all the potential capability of our new site.
I haven’t even touched on what an amazing job Pemaquid did with the transfer of content and the overall transition. They made the process so easy for us and were careful and considerate about our general lack of knowledge about web site development.
I look forward to our ongoing work with Pemaquid as we develop new ways to better communicate MeHAF’s message.
Expert information is useless if it is unorganized. Pemaquid works closely to truly understand MeHAF’s goals – and those of any organization they support – before recommending how to maximize the website in presenting information. You can lead viewers to websites, but you can’t make them interact with them — Pemaquid solves this problem for MeHAF.