Do you (medical) write like a human?

Have you ever asked someone or been asked yourself, to turn complex (medical) information into something ‘patient friendly’? You know, use lay language (although, who uses the phrase ‘lay language’?) and make sure it’s ‘patient centric’!

It’s easy work, right?

Not really, no. Admittedly, my medical writer brain has taken this approach to patient writing before – translate existing clinical content into easier-to-understand language. I was pretty good at translating: changing the length of my sentences, reducing the number of syllables, and using familiar terminology (see those 5 syllables in ‘terminology’? I would use the word ‘words’ to improve readability when I’m being ‘patient centric’). But that’s only part of the job.

Patients, or people, need more than clarity; they need connection. They need content that speaks to them, their experiences, and their emotions.

My Nan’s lemon drizzle test

Take my Nan’s lemon drizzle cake as an example: I put the right ingredients in again and again and again, and what I get out is good, but it’s not quite right. It’s not my Nan’s. Why?

It’s missing the squeeze my Nan gave me as I walked through the door. The warmth of the mug in my hand, as we laughed about whatever my little cousin had gotten her up to that week. The little plate, shaped like a flower, that she serves my cake on every time – the same plate I’ve had since before I can remember. One for each of my cousins too, but all with different colours. Mine was the red one. She’d never forget whose was whose. Then there’s the cake. A little zing and crunch from the drizzle, and the buttery, sweet sponge. It was as it always is – nostalgic and bloody heavenly.

Good writing vs. excellent writing

That’s the difference between my cake and my Nan’s: the warmth, the intention, the familiarity, the comfort. The human connection.

And that’s the difference between good and excellent writing for patients.

You can follow a process step by step, ticking off the ingredients – simplify the science, break it down into steps, outline what people should expect – like you’re following a recipe. What you’ll get out of this process is fine, like my attempt at a lemon drizzle cake. It’ll be technically correct, but missing the things that make it unforgettable. Like compassion, warmth, and relatability.

This is why listening to, talking to, and meeting with patients is so important. To understand their experiences, you need to engage with them, and to capture and reflect their experience you need to feel it, breathe it, and channel it through your words. If you do this properly, you’ll start wondering why you’re so tired by 3pm. To get emotion out, you need to put emotion in.

What AI can never do

This is what differentiates our craft from AI. AI can find me a lemon drizzle recipe, no problem – but what it can’t do, is replicate everything that makes my Nan’s lemon drizzle cake hers: the warmth, the care, the human connection.  It’s the same when writing for patients – you can tell AI to mimic a specific style, tone or even give it an example patient profile to embody, but it will never be able to know and replicate the whole experience, and patients deserve more than that.  To capture the human experience, you need to be a human.

Co-creating with patients

My most recent project as part of our PX+CX team granted me the time and space to talk to patients and to truly understand their experiences. Because of this, for what felt like the first time, I was crafting genuinely meaningful content. But not just creating it, co-creating it with the people who’re experts in their own experiences.

We’re showing up as humans first, and medical writers second. And in part 2, we’ll tell you exactly how we’re doing it.