RESOURCES
A repository of websites and courses for medical communicators
COVID-19
The COVID-19 Vaccine Communication Handbook: A practical guide for improving vaccine communication and fighting miscommunication
Developed by a team of scientific experts, this guide aims to arm people with practical tips and provide up-to-date information and evidence to talk reliably about the vaccines, reduce fear and constructively challenge associated myths.
Education and qualifications
Postgraduate university courses in health communication:
- Master of Health Communication at Sydney University
- Graduate Diploma in Health Communication at Sydney University
- Master of Science Communication at The University of Western Australia
Undergraduate blended degree:
Short courses can help writers upskill in specific areas including editing, consumer health writing, freelance writing, magazine writing and technical writing
Science journalism
WFSJ
A free online course for budding science writers and journalists, developed by a team of 35 writers and editors
Copy writing and more
Australian Writers Centre
Fundamentals of technical writing
University of Western Australia
Journalism, editing & publishing
Australian College
Copyediting course
Capstone Editing
Learn how to perform comprehensive, high-quality copyediting of corporate, government and academic documents such as, postgraduate essays, theses, journal articles and manuscripts.
Understanding Medical Research: Your Facebook Friend is Wrong
Yale University via Coursera
Learn to critically evaluation of medical research, read and understand statistical figures, charts, and graphics and how to verify
claims made in news articles.
AMWA Professional Development Program
Australasian Medical Writers Association
Successful science writing and editing
Biotext
Learn how to make complex information easy to read and understand, and how to use editing skills to improve your own and other people’s work.
Readability tools
These tools help ensure your writing is easy to understand:
Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG)
Assesses the readability of your prose
Gunning's Fog Index (FOG)
Calculates the Gunning Fog Index – a weighted average of the number of words per sentence, and the number of long words per word.
The Up-Goer Five Text Editor
Assists in communicating complex concepts and ideas in simple language.
Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool (PEMAT) and user's guide
Helps you assess how understandable and actionable print and audiovisual patient education materials are
Plain language summary toolkit
Envision Pharma Group has developed a best-practice resource for PLS of peer-reviewed publications and congress abstracts
The EAST framework for behaviour change
Four simple ways to apply behavioural insights
Medical writing career resources
From academic to medical writer
A guide to getting started in medical communications
MedCommsNetworking
Networking and dialogue amongst professionals working in medcomms
Science communication toolkit
Practical tools developed by experts to help science communicators, researchers, journalists and policy makers add quality, impact and influence to their science engagement activities
Health Writer Hub
Blogs, short online health writing courses and free resources for health writers
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Ragan's Healthcare blog
News in healthcare social media, marketing and communications
Codes of conduct, guidelines and style and grammar resources
Code of Conduct, Medicines Australia
Therapeutic Goods Administration advertising guidelines
Therapeutic Guidelines series
Cambridge Guide to Australian English Usage
AMWA Manual of Style
Scientific Style and Format: the CSE Style Manual for Authors, Editors and Publishers
Australian Manual of Scientific Style
Australian Government Style Manual 2020
Accessing journals
PubMed
Archive of medical journal literature with links to the full-text sources
Unpaywall
Unpaywall is a legal, open-source database that allows you to access free scholarly articles
Health reporting
Cancer
Cancer Institute NSW guidelines for writing about cancer
Mental health issues
Mindframe's guidelines for communicating about mental health issues, including suicide and alcohol and other drugs
Alcohol & drug addiction
Independent A.O.D Media Watch guidelines for journalists reporting on alcohol and other drugs to reduce stigma, minimise harm and improve
accurate reporting
Diabetes
Position statement from Diabetes Australia on improving communication with and about people with diabetes
Dementia
Guidelines developed by Dementia Australia, for talking or writing about dementia and people living with dementia
Eating disorders
Guidelines developed by Mindframe and the National Eating Disorders Collaboration for reporting on eating disorders
Disability
Guidelines developed by Disability Australia for portraying people with disability
Reporting on medicines
Tips to help journalists accurately and responsibly reflect independent, reliable evidence in their writing and reporting on
medicines, medical tests and treatments.
Medical writing associations
- American Medical Writers Association
- European Medical Writers Association
- Australian Science Communicators
- Freelance Editors’ Network
- Council of Science Editors
- World Association of Medical Editors
- European Association of Science Editors
- The Board of Editors in the Life Sciences (BELS)
- The International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP)
- Society for Technical Communication
- International Science Writers Association
- American Copy Editors Society
- Canadian Science Writers Association
- Association of Health Care Journalists
- Freeline – The Australian Freelance Writers Network