National Kidney Foundation of Illinois

Did you know that over one million people in Illinois are affected with chronic kidney disease? That is nearly 10% of the population of Illinois. All of whom need access to resources, support, and care. That is where the National Kidney Foundation of Illinois (NKFI) steps in. NKFI is a non-profit organization that provides education and support for patients and healthcare professionals in Illinois regarding chronic kidney disease. They connect individuals across Illinois to communicate about fundraising events, programs, and outreach initiatives.

The Needs

NKFI was in need of a website that could support patients and healthcare professionals alike. Specifically, they were aiming to target individuals who may have recently learned they have kidney disease and want to learn more about NKFI’s free KidneyMoblie screening programs. The NKFI team knew it was time to give their site a facelift, so they reached out to Studio Pax to create a platform that would cater to their multifaceted needs.

These needs were an inclusion of all of the information necessary for their constituents – both healthcare professionals and patients – on the site, updated site formatting and navigation, logo and branding that matched the national brand, links to NKFI’s social media pages, and the ability for NKFI staff to manage the site after the project was complete.

The Process

To achieve these needs, members of the NKFI team came to Studio Pax and white boarded ideas to illustrate what they were looking for – specifically, the areas they wanted information to be housed on the site and ways to make the site look easily navigable by NKFI constituents and other site visitors.

The Result

These varied aspects of its mission resulted in a number of changes. We added a dash of clean and distinctive design to create clarity and ease of navigation for both mobile and desktop including a clear calendar listing and a natural event management tool. To provide necessary information for NFKI constituents, we incorporated infographics to help communicate key data points about Illinois, a seamless data integration with existing healthcare professionals listings, and information about fundraising efforts.

Furthermore, we matched all NKFI branding to the National Kidney Foundation umbrella brand and added social media widgets at the bottom of the homepage for easy access to the NKFI social channels. We added these elements all while keeping the site easy to maintain so that the NKFI team could do so on their own going forward. We took each of these measures to create a site that is both useful and beautiful, two elements we always strive for here at Studio Pax.

Visit the NKFI Website

The Importance of Mobility

When over 80% of screened patients are found to have at least one significantly abnormal test result during a screening, it’s essential to make these screenings readily available to all communities, near and far. The Mobile screening section of the website allows patients to use their phones to access a real-time view of the free KidneyMobile screenings offered by NKFI. The result is a functionality with a lot of heart behind it.

The Power of Social Media

In 2006, the time the NKFI site was originally created, social media was not nearly as important as it is now. Many of NKFI’s constituents come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and primarily access content on their phones so it was essential to make the NKFI social channels clear, concise, and easy to find on the site. The homepage of the site now features widgets that link to each of the NKFI social channels including Facebook and Twitter.