Why Medical Writers Need to Be Good at Talking to More Than One Audience

One of the skills I use most as an ICU nurse is something I didn't learn from a textbook: code-switching.

Code-switching is the ability to adjust the way you communicate depending on who you're talking to and what that person needs from the conversation. The term is often used in the context of language, culture or social situations. For example, you talk differently with your best friend than you do with your boss. The same idea applies to healthcare communication.

In the ICU, I do this constantly in real time. I can listen to, understand and synthesize information from a wide range of people, from physicians and administrators to patients and families, and adapt it fluently across audiences while keeping the clinical accuracy intact throughout.

Sometimes that means discussing a patient's condition with their surgeon, which is where I pull out that fancy medical jargon. Then, within the same five minutes, I may need to explain that exact situation to a frightened family member who has no medical background. The clinical information hasn't changed, but how I communicate it has. That distinction is important in medical writing, too.

Medical writers rarely have just one audience

Medical content can involve the same subject matter but very different readers. A physician may want to understand the clinical evidence behind a treatment. A patient may want to know what the treatment means for them. A healthcare administrator may be more interested in implementation, outcomes or how a new technology fits into an existing system.

All three audiences may need accurate information about the same topic, but they aren't starting from the same place. They don't necessarily have the same questions, background knowledge, or reason for reading it. A good medical writer has to recognize that.

That doesn't mean changing the facts depending on the audience. It means understanding which facts matter most, what needs to be explained and what context the reader needs in order to understand the information correctly.

It's more than removing medical jargon

When people talk about making medical writing accessible, the conversation often focuses on jargon. Sure, medical writers need to know when a technical term will help and when it will only make a piece harder to understand, but code-switching goes further than swapping out complicated words for simpler ones.

You have to understand the subject well enough to know what can be simplified without losing meaning, and you also have to understand your reader well enough to know what shouldn't be simplified.

For example, a physician reading about a new clinical tool will need a much more detailed explanation of how it works than a patient reading a consumer health article. Giving both audiences the same level of detail isn't necessarily more accurate or more useful. In some cases, it simply gets in the way of what the reader is actually trying to learn. The challenge is knowing where that line is.

I've had to practice this in real time

In the ICU, information comes from everywhere: vital signs, labs, physician orders, imaging, medications, consults and conversations with patients and families. Part of my job is synthesizing all of that information and figuring out what matters, but understanding the information is only half of the job — I also have to communicate it.

That might mean talking through a patient's clinical status with a physician who wants the relevant details quickly. It might mean explaining to an administrator why something matters from a patient-care perspective. Or it might mean sitting with a family member and explaining what is happening without overwhelming them with terminology they have never heard before.

I may be talking about the same patient in each conversation, but I'm not having the same conversation. That's because effective communication isn't just about knowing what to say. It's about knowing how to say it to the person in front of you.

Translating medical information quickly and accurately between patients and hospital colleagues is a crucial part of being an ICU nurse. Doing the same in writing is just as important.

Why this matters when writing about medicine

Medical writers have to make these same decisions, even though the conversation is happening on a page instead of at a bedside. A piece of content can be completely factually correct and still fail its audience. It can assume too much knowledge, bury the important information under unnecessary detail or simplify a complicated subject so much that the nuance gets lost.

None of those problems are solved by simply knowing more medical terminology. You have to be able to take complex information, understand what is actually important and then communicate it in a way that makes sense to the person reading it.

That's where my clinical background becomes useful.

I've spent 11 years learning how to move between different audiences without losing the underlying clinical meaning. I've had to explain the same situation to a leading specialist and a frightened family member within minutes of each other, and I've had to make decisions about what each person actually needs to understand.

That experience translates directly to medical writing. Whether I'm writing for a healthcare professional, a patient, a healthcare organization or a broader consumer audience, I don't want to simply translate medical information into different words.

I want to understand the audience well enough to know what will actually help them. In medical writing, accuracy is essential, but accuracy alone isn't enough. The information also has to reach the reader in a form they can understand, trust and use. That's a skill I've been practicing every time I walk into an ICU room.