VUMC Web Development

Please forward or call Betsy Brandes, Director of VUMC Web and Creative Services (322-2876) if you have questions or comments about the VUMC Web Standards or need help securing Web development resources.

Over the years, Vanderbilt University Medical Center has worked hard to attain the highest level of excellence in medical and nursing education, research, and patient care. To maintain that reputation in today's competitive health care environment, we must concern ourselves with the image we project. In years past, we have concentrated our efforts through traditional publications and promotional materials, stationary and business cards. Today, we expand our communication horizons to include the World Wide Web.

The communication tools we use convey an important, lasting impression on our patients, referring physicians, alumni, future students, and other important constituents. VUMC has been successful in the development and maintenance of its identification/publication campaign over the last nine years. Now, it is time to invite the same success into our image on the World Wide Web.

The way we identify ourselves, through all methods of communications, is necessarily complex because of who we are and how we are structured. As Vanderbilt Medical Center, we are first part of Vanderbilt University. Then, within the Medical Center, we consist of five distinct components: The Vanderbilt Clinic, Vanderbilt University Hospital, Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, and Vanderbilt University School of Nursing.

Each component of the Medical Center, while having its own agenda, is also part of the whole and therefore needs to be clearly identified and accessible to our audience. A uniform and professional communication standard helps us achieve this end.

The following paragraphs will outline the standards and Web development procedures necessary to continue our successful image campaign as related to the Web. They are:

 
Commercial Vendors

With the enactment of the new VUMC Web Initiative (March 2008), commercial vendors are limited to custom database programming and tool creation. The SiteBuilder tool is used to create and maintain all VUMC Web sites unless special permission is secured through the VUMC Web Team.