Med Student Website Critique

[RKmd]

Hello all,

I'm currently on my summer break and have a chance to make some tweaks to my site's template. Over the last few months, I've thrown random pieces of JS and CSS on there, but truth be told, I have very little knowledge with regards to aesthetically pleasing design. I'm looking to incorporate more CSS3, but am wondering if any of you have other suggestions with regard to design elements? The website URL is in my signature.

Thanks in advance!

 

[AFPoster]

Looks great, I'm a newb with design stuff, any chance you can teach me, haha.

 

[jdavtz]

A few thoughts.

I like the overall design. Very clear, clean, good-looking.

The top banner could lose a bit of space between the logo and the menu options.

The "welcome to rk.md" section keeps changing before I can read something properly, and the "clinical wisdom on twitter" text doesn't link anywhere.

I'd get rid of the "legal" stuff that you have on every page. Either just delete it altogether, or have a tiny link at the bottom that takes the reader to a page with that stuff on it. I don't expect anyone can take legal action against you if they read your website and then decide to do something stupid. If you keep the legal blurb, I'd change the bit that sounds like it says "the stuff on the website isn't meant as medical advice, but contact me via the link instead" -- I'm presuming you don't want people using that link to ask you medical questions.

Hope things go well in med school! Feel free to PM me if you want any advice related to paediatrics (I'm going into 7th year postgrad here in the UK, it's 10 years total of postgrad training to become a consultant here (2yrs general, 8yrs paeds) after the 5 years in university).

 

[RKmd]

Thanks to both of you for your replies!!

Looks great, I'm a newb with design stuff, any chance you can teach me, haha.

I wish I had more time, but my recommendation is to peruse online forums and other websites to learn on a trial-and-error basis. It takes more time, but I find that people tend to learn better that way. Firefox plugins like Firebug and YSlow help tremendously in analyzing CSS/HTML as well as optimizations.

The top banner could lose a bit of space between the logo and the menu options.

The "welcome to rk.md" section keeps changing before I can read something properly, and the "clinical wisdom on twitter" text doesn't link anywhere.

I'd get rid of the "legal" stuff that you have on every page.

I added 20 more pixels to separate the logo from the nav bar in the header and adjusted the transition time from 6.5 seconds to 10 seconds in the tabbed welcome section. I had originally coded it such that if a viewer wanted to go back and see a tab, clicking the tab would stop the auto-transition indefinitely until a page refresh was invoked, but the additional time by default is a great suggestion.

As far as the legal stuff, two weeks ago, that section actually wasn't on any pages. I added it per the recommendation of several faculty members who found this site, and with all the hype around physicians utilizing social media these days, I'd like for it to be in clear view rather than a link to my Site Info page.

I'm actually not doing pediatrics till my 4th year, but I've heard great things from my colleagues! Heck, I'm 23 years old and still see my pediatrician for annual checkups. Best of luck as you finish that long and impressive journey!