From the judges: This is a very thoughtful and clean website, with up-to-date, accurate content. It is a no-cost upgrade that gives interns a resume sample with great benefits to the school. We love how the website links animal owners with UC Davis experts in a one-stop location for pet owners to find reliable, scientifically sound answers about their pet’s health. We appreciate how they leverage social media (Facebook and Instagram) to help expand the audience beyond subscribers to generate more pageviews. This low-cost website can serve as a model for a broad range of institutions, even those outside of higher education.
UC Davis Animal Health Topics
Category
Communications > Communications Improvement
Description
Award: Gold
Institution: University of California, Davis
Title of Entry: UC Davis Animal Health Topics
About this Entry: The UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine Animal Health Topics website is a database of common health subjects of concern for domestic animal species. It is a way to link animal owners and caretakers with UC Davis experts in a variety of areas and provide the most advanced and up to date information. The entries range from behavior issues to infectious diseases and are the result of collaborative efforts with UC Davis faculty and clinicians. Entries are linked to UC Davis departments that can provide additional information and services. The original site was simply a list of links (see attached image) and needed a new look, updated content, and search optimization. A new site was created in June 2019 to address these needs. Existing content was updated and new images were added. Efforts have focused on adding new content to the database. From June 30, 2019 to August 20, 2020, 61 new health topics were added to the site. To date, there are 167 health topic entries across five categories (cats, dogs, horses, livestock and exotics).