Why service pages fail patients
Read a typical functional medicine or chiropractic service page aloud and count the words a patient would have to look up. "Comprehensive root-cause assessment." "Neuromuscular re-education." "Integrative protocol." Each phrase is accurate to the practitioner and nearly empty to the person deciding whether to book. The page is written for peers, and patients are the ones reading it.
Healthy People 2030, the federal health goals framework, defines health literacy in two parts. Personal health literacy is a person’s ability to find, understand and use information to make health decisions. Organizational health literacy is "the degree to which organizations enable individuals" to do the same.1 The second definition puts the job on the practice. If a patient cannot understand your service page, that is a page problem.
Assume every reader needs it clear
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality publishes a Health Literacy Universal Precautions Toolkit, now in its third edition. It promotes "the structuring of health information and services in ways that everyone can understand and use", rather than guessing who needs extra help.2 The toolkit has 23 tools for busy practices, grouped into five areas, one of which is improving written communication.2
For a website, universal precautions mean one standard for every page. You do not write a clear version for new patients and a technical version for everyone else. A highly educated patient reading on a phone between meetings benefits from the same clarity.
What plain language means in practice
The federal plain language guidance, now published on Digital.gov, supports the Plain Writing Act of 2010, which requires federal content for the public to be written for its specific audience.6 That law binds federal agencies, not private practices, but the guidance works for anyone writing for patients. The guidance says content is easier to understand when it uses shorter words, short sections, active voice and present tense.3
Two of its rules fix most service pages. First, use active voice, because it "makes it clear who should do what."3 "Your first visit includes a physical exam" is clearer than "A physical exam will be performed." Second, avoid hidden verbs, where an action is turned into a noun: "we conduct an analysis of" becomes "we analyze".3
| Written for peers | Written for patients |
|---|---|
| Comprehensive initial functional medicine intake | Your first visit: 90 minutes, covering your history, symptoms and goals |
| Neuromuscular re-education protocols are utilized | We use exercises that retrain how your muscles and joints move together |
| Individualized nutritional interventions | A food plan written for you, reviewed every four weeks |
| Treatment frequency is determined on a case-by-case basis | Most plans start with weekly visits. We review this with you at each visit |
| Contraindications may apply | This is not right for everyone. We ask about pregnancy, medicines and past surgery first |
The rewrites in that table are examples of style, not claims about any practice. Every fact on your own page, such as visit length or review schedule, has to be one you actually deliver.
Check the page with the CDC Clear Communication Index
The CDC Clear Communication Index is a research-based tool for building and scoring public communication materials. It has 4 introductory questions and 20 scored items drawn from the communication research literature.4 Its items include one main message placed where readers see it first, a call to action, active voice, common words, bulleted or numbered lists, and chunks with headings.4 CDC also publishes "Everyday Words for Public Health Communication", a list of jargon terms with plainer replacements.4
You do not need to score every page formally. Use the index as a pre-publish checklist. If a service page has no single main message, or ends without telling the patient what to do next, it fails before anyone has read a word of the medical detail.
A service page structure that works
- What it is, in one sentence a 12-year-old could repeat.
- Who it may help, and who should not book it or should talk to their doctor first.
- What happens at the visit, in the order it happens.
- How long it takes, how many visits are typical, and what it costs.
- Who delivers it, with their credentials and a link to their bio.
- What the evidence says, in careful words, with the source next to the claim.
- One next step, such as "Book a first visit".
Item six is where plain language and compliance meet. Clear wording does not license stronger claims. "May help some people with lower back pain" is plain and defensible. "Fixes back pain" is plain and not defensible. The rules on that are in health claims on a practice website.
Does plain language help search and AI answers?
Google’s guidance on helpful content asks whether a page shows first-hand expertise and whether it is "self-evident to your visitors who authored your content". It calls trust the most important part of E-E-A-T, and says health is one of the topics where that matters most.5 A service page that names who delivers the service, explains the visit in plain words, and cites its sources checks all three.
AI assistants quote sentences. A sentence that says what the service is, who it is for and what it costs can be lifted into an answer intact. A paragraph of stacked jargon cannot. More on that in becoming the practice AI recommends, and clear pages also serve patients using screen readers, as covered in website accessibility for health practices.
If you want your service pages rewritten this way, with every claim checked, that is part of a credibility audit. This post explains public guidance on plain language and health literacy. It is not legal or medical advice.