PagePlane.com

April 23, 2010

Ideas 101

Design: The importance of making information accessible

A recent article in the New York Times points to a simple list that is making a rather profound difference in the world of medicine. "...A year after surgical teams at eight hospitals adopted a 19-item checklist, the average patient death rate fell more than 40 percent..."

A list is certainly the most rudimentary type of design structure, but it's easy to forget how important such "first principles" are. The information contained in the checklist at the center of this story is not new or unknown, it is that the way the information is organized and presented makes it accessible in a new and important way.

Stephen Sondheim says that, "Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos." Here is proof of the power of order.