American Society of Plastic Surgeons
UX Architecture & Content Strategy
Webby Award — Healthcare, 2012
Role: UX lead
2011-Siteworx
Healthcare / Professional Association
Information Architecture & Content Strategy
The American Society of Plastic Surgeons represents 96% of all board-certified plastic surgeons in the United States. Their website needed to serve two very different audiences — patients seeking information and making high-stakes decisions about their care, and medical professionals managing their practices, accessing resources, and purchasing supplies. When I came on as UX lead, the site was doing neither job well.
The challenge
The existing site was difficult to navigate and poorly organized. Content had accumulated over time without a coherent structure to hold it — procedures mixed with organizational information, patient resources buried under layers of navigation, no clear path for someone who simply wanted to understand their options or find a qualified surgeon nearby.
The dual-audience challenge was at the core of everything. A patient arriving to learn about reconstructive surgery has entirely different needs than a physician logging in to order materials for their office. The architecture needed to hold both — cleanly, without either audience having to wade through content meant for the other.
Methods
The process was deeply collaborative from the start. I worked directly with the client through a series of interviews and workshops — not just to gather requirements, but to surface the organizational priorities, content ownership questions, and audience assumptions that were shaping the problem. That shared understanding informed every decision that followed.
From there I moved through a structured progression: content inventories and audits to understand what existed and what was actually needed, content organization documents to establish hierarchy and grouping, and then into page flows and wireframes. Each phase was presented back to the client with enough context to make real decisions — not just react to layouts.
Content strategy was woven throughout, not added at the end. Voice, tone, labeling, and the way procedures were named and categorized all required careful attention in an environment where medical accuracy and plain-language accessibility had to coexist.
Key features architected
PATIENT-FACING
Find a Surgeon
PATIENT-FACING
Cosmetic Procedures education
PATIENT-FACING
Reconstructive Procedures education
PATIENT-FACING
Patient Saftey
MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS
Physician Storefront
MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS
Member resources & education
Solution
I designed the full user experience from the ground up — information architecture, page hierarchy, user flows, and content strategy. The site was restructured around two clear pathways: one for patients, one for medical professionals. Each audience gets a coherent, purposeful experience without the friction of navigating through content that isn't meant for them.
The patient side was organized around the decisions people actually make. Procedures were split into cosmetic and reconstructive — a distinction that matters deeply to patients — with educational content structured to build understanding and confidence before connecting users to a qualified surgeon. The Find a Surgeon feature became a central destination, not an afterthought buried in the footer.
The medical professional side gave physicians a proper home on the site — a dedicated section with access to their accounts, educational resources, publications, and a storefront for ordering materials for their offices. This had previously required workarounds and manual processes; the new architecture made it a native, integrated experience.
The visual design has been updated since 2011 — but the underlying information architecture, content hierarchy, and user flows I established remain intact today. The navigation structure, the cosmetic/reconstructive split, the Find a Surgeon placement, the dual-audience separation — all of it still stands. That's what good architecture does: it last.
Note: This project was completed in 2011 while at Siteworx. The visual aesthetic has since been refreshed, but the UX architecture and content strategy remain unchanged.
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