A patient choosing a hospital has three questions and limited patience. Most clinic websites answer none of them and lead with a photo of the building instead.
When someone lands on a hospital website, they are rarely browsing. They have a symptom, a referral, or a worry about a family member, and three questions: Can I see the right specialist? Will my cover pay for it? How soon can I be seen? Answer those and you have a patient. Lead with a stock photo of a smiling receptionist and a paragraph about your commitment to excellence, and they are already looking at the next result. ## List your consultants by what they treat Not an alphabetical staff directory. A patient with chest pain is looking for cardiology, and they want to know a named consultant exists, what they specialise in, and when they hold clinic. Credentials matter here more than almost anywhere else on the web. Fellowships, training, years in practice. This is one of the few industries where listing qualifications is not boasting, it is the information the reader came for. ## Say which insurers and HMOs you accept Plainly, as a list, on a page someone can find without calling. This single piece of information decides whether a patient comes to you or somewhere else, and leaving it off generates phone calls that your reception has to answer all day. ## Let them book without a referral, if that is true If a patient can book directly, say so where the booking button is. If a referral is required for some services and not others, say which. Ambiguity costs you the appointment. The booking form should ask for the minimum: who they are, how to reach them, what they need, and when. Everything else can be collected at the desk. Every extra field is another chance to abandon. ## Be specific about diagnostics and turnaround "Modern facilities" means nothing. "CT, MRI, ultrasound and an on-site pathology lab, with most results released within 24 hours" means something, and it is the detail that wins a patient who is comparing two hospitals. ## Put the emergency number where panic can find it In the header, on every page, tappable on a phone. Someone in an emergency is not navigating a menu. If you have 24/7 emergency cover, that line should be visible without scrolling. ## Health content earns the visit before it is needed Articles written by your own consultants do two jobs. They bring in people searching symptoms, which is how most healthcare journeys start online, and they demonstrate the expertise of the person who would be treating them. Write what patients actually ask about. What a blood pressure reading means. What happens in the first ninety minutes of a heart attack. When a fever needs A&E rather than a clinic. Put the consultant's name on it. ## Say what you are licensed by Regulatory licences, accreditations, certifications. In healthcare, trust signals are not decoration; they are part of the decision, and a patient choosing between two unfamiliar hospitals will use them. ## The test Open your hospital website on a phone. Can you find a cardiologist, confirm your HMO is accepted, and request an appointment, in under a minute, without calling anyone? If not, that is the entire project.