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Responsive Design and the New Medicare.gov

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Medicare, Responsive Design
Jon Booth Director, Website & New Media Group, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
Monday, September 24, 2012

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) launched a major redesign of the Medicare.gov website making content more accessible and easier for beneficiaries, their families, and caregivers to understand.

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This redesign represents three major milestones:

  1. Mobile: The redesign of Medicare.gov is our first full dive into mobile-friendly web design. We are using "responsive design" which is a new approach to web design that allows us to provide an optimal viewing experience on any device. This allows us to support traditional desktop PCs, tablets, and smartphones all from one URL and code base. That is, there is not a separate mobile or M-Dot website, but Medicare.gov itself is fully optimized when viewed on a mobile device.
  2. Working Better: The migration of Medicare.gov to the Percussion content management system means that for the first time, all of CMS' public websites are managed using the same system. This greatly increases efficiencies and allows us to reuse the same management processes across all of our websites.
  3. People First: This redesign fully embraced the principles of good web management and governance. It is the result of more than two years of research, design, and development work by CMS. Using call center questions, website analytics, and online survey results, CMS identified top user tasks including finding out what Medicare covers, cost and coordination of benefits information, and finding Medicare drug and health plans.

These changes take us strongly in the direction laid out in the Federal CIO's Digital Government Strategy. And the Digital Strategy will be a key driver of all of our web initiatives over the next 12-18 months.

Help us field test our site. Visit Medicare.gov on a smartphone or tablet and let us know what you think! What do you like and what can we work to improve?

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Comments

Submitted by Anonymous on
The comment of 9/26/12 10:25 is an example of the prejudice of ageism that stereotypes older adults and reinforces aging as incompetence and disability. That prejudicial stereotype causes learned helplessness and increases the health care costs significantly! Appreciating and understanding the promotion of the "Liberation" stage as competent with creativity and resilience adds 7.5 years of healthy living to the end of life, cutting costs for stereotypical prejudices.
Submitted by Anonymous on
I like the new design on the main Medicare.gov web site. I would however, like to make a suggestion for the "Plan Finder" section. Is there any way to streamline the process when there is already an existing Drug List ID number? Perhaps Step 1 could initially ask if there is an existing Drug List ID and Password already established, then ask for any updates. Some people often visit this site for updates to plans offered.
Submitted by Anonymous on
Looks greta and user friendily.
Submitted by Anonymous on
Remember you are dealing with older Americans with older eyes and folks it would be most helpful if the tiny print on some of the items were actually big enough to read. Thank you for asking and have a great day. [name withheld for privacy]
Submitted by Anonymous on
...this is definitly a step in the right direction...
Submitted by Anonymous on
you spent a lot of money on design and research that could have been used to pay claims and keep cost down. Yaaah, good going.
Submitted by Anonymous on
I have neither a "smart phone" or a Tablet. I am 70 yrs. of age and "home bound", I have a normal dumb new cellphone, I also have a MacPro Desktop Computer. I spend all day on this computer doing important things. Medicare is very important, it is astounding that so called smart phones are being catered to, and astounding to me that now that includes such importance regarding anything Medicare! I did not read that Mac's were mentioned above. Anyone who bothers to even read these comments need to know so called Smart Phones are not safe, and totally inappropriate for information regarding Medicare. So what is coming soon for all of those like myself? As for Social Media, nothing important should ever use the so called Social Media. We are in a time where hackers already are doing well. Social Media for all important things is totally inappropriate. My mind is totally fine, please get some sense and do not use either Social Media or Cellphones. Your wonderful new plan is quite Scary!
Submitted by Anonymous on
Wow looks great and will be user friendly.
Submitted by Anonymous on
Well done. The new site is working great on my new iPhone 5.
Submitted by Anonymous on
I am all for just one web site that works on all platforms as long the web page is clean and not overly cluttered, and at the same time not having to click infinite times paging thru many layers of popups.

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