Updating Medical Website Content: What to Review, Rewrite, or Retire

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Updating medical website content starts with a decision about each page: keep it, correct it, rewrite it, combine it with another resource, or remove it from publication. The work should leave readers with useful information and your team with a clear record of what changed.

Picture a medication article that has been quietly doing its job for years. The introduction still reads well. The links mostly open. Then someone notices that a recommendation rests on an older guideline, and nobody is sure which other pages repeat it.

PharmacoLegal Consulting Services™ can review existing medical articles and medication resources, identify the revisions needed, and quote for updates or rewritten content. Explore clinical content review or request a content review quote for a page or a group of pages.

Which pages should you review first?

Begin with content that could affect a reader’s understanding of treatment: medication use, benefits and harms, warnings, monitoring, or recommendations. Give attention to pages affected by a known evidence or guidance change, a reader complaint, or a concern raised by your clinical team.

Then consider where people actually arrive. A widely visited page with an unresolved clinical question deserves prompt attention. Use your page inventory and available traffic information to organize the queue; low traffic does not make a potentially misleading statement acceptable.

FDA’s Drug Safety Communications explain that new safety information can lead to changes in prescribing information or patient Medication Guides.^[1] That is one reason a medication page may need another review after its original publication.

Build an inventory your editor can use

For each page, record the URL, topic, intended reader, publication or last substantive review date, and the question that triggered the update. Add the current version or a saved copy so the team can track what was assessed.

You can start with a small group. Five related medication explainers may be a more useful first assignment than an undefined request to “refresh the website.”

Identify who will approve clinical changes and who will publish the revised copy. If the same explanation appears in a downloadable handout or another article, include that connection in the inventory.

Check the clinical content before polishing the prose

Ask whether the important claims remain supported by appropriate sources. Check the population, treatment comparison, outcomes, uncertainty, and any advice the reader might take from the page.

Look beyond publication year. An older study can remain relevant, while a newer reference can still fail to support a sentence. The reference-checking guide explains how to assess the connection between a claim and its citation.

Review medicine names, formulations, units, and the context of any treatment instructions. A change to one passage may require corresponding edits elsewhere so the article remains internally consistent.

Review, rewrite, combine, or retire?

A practical content review should recommend an action and explain why. Here is a useful starting framework.

Keep

The page still answers a useful question and the assessed claims remain supported. Record what was checked.

Correct

The overall article works, but specific statements, references, or explanations need revision.

Rewrite

The structure or central explanation needs substantial work to serve the intended reader.

Combine

Several pages answer substantially the same question, and a unified resource would make the information easier to use.

Retire

The page no longer serves its intended purpose and cannot usefully be corrected or incorporated elsewhere.

For a real page, choose the action after reviewing the content. If a URL is being removed or consolidated, your web team should handle navigation, redirects where appropriate, and any other technical consequences.

A worked example: one passage, several connected edits

Original editorial demonstration. This imagined example does not describe a medicine, real guidance change, or client project.

A page summarizes an older recommendation. The reviewer finds that the relevant guidance now distinguishes two patient groups, while the page addresses them as one.

• Clinical task: check the current source, the populations it covers, and what the change means for the page’s claims.
• Writing task: revise the affected explanation, heading, and FAQ answer so they tell a consistent story.
• Publishing task: update the references and review record, and check other pages or handouts that repeat the explanation.

Changing a sentence without checking those connections can leave the old message elsewhere on the site. A useful update follows the claim through the places readers encounter it.

Read the revised page from the reader’s perspective

Does the opening answer the question? Can a patient understand the explanation without mistaking general information for a personal treatment instruction? Do headings and graphics help the reader follow the meaning?

CDC’s Clear Communication Index offers research-based criteria for assessing public communication.^[2] MedlinePlus also encourages readers to look for sources, qualifications, a review process, and meaningful dates when assessing health information.^[3]

Show the actual work performed. Record a substantive update when the content has been changed or assessed; changing a date alone does not resolve an unsupported claim.

What should your team receive?

For a group of pages, the proposal can include an inventory with recommended actions, annotated clinical findings, and revised copy for the agreed pages. State whether the assignment includes new research, direct editing, a final recheck, or publishing support.

The review report guide shows how findings can lead to useful decisions. If substantial new copy is needed, the medical writer hiring guide explains the commissioning process.

To start, send the page URLs, audience, approximate volume, any known concerns, and deadline. Request a Content Review Quote and receive a proposal covering the work, deliverables, fee, and timing.

Frequently asked questions

References

1. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Drug Safety Communications.
2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Clear Communication Index User Guide.
3. National Library of Medicine. MedlinePlus. Evaluating Health Information.