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Enhance comprehension of over-the-counter drug instructions for the general public and medical professionals through visualization design

Mengjie Fan, Katrin Angerbauer, Yinchu Cheng, Yingying Yan, Xiaohan Xu, Tianfu Wang, Michael Sedlmair, Yu Yang^*, Liang Zhou^*

Computers & Graphics
^*Corresponding authors

DOI arXiv

Abstract

Drug instructions are crucial for guiding the rational use of medication. We conduct a visualization design study to enhance the comprehension of over-the-counter (OTC) drug instructions, targeting both the general public and medical professionals. We devise two tailored drug instruction designs for different audience groups through an iterative design process. A controlled user study reveals that our design outperforms traditional text-based instructions in terms of response time and usability, and the availability of two versions is also found to be beneficial. This study also motivates a taxonomy based on a systematic classification of OTC drug instructions sampled from an official drug database, which received positive expert feedback. Finally, this study summarizes a workflow for a visualization design strategy based on our design exploration and user study feedback, which can be generalized to other OTC drug instructions.

The graphical abstract.

The simplified version of the visualization design for paracetamol. Three common modules are included in both the simplified and the complete versions: (1) The basic information and navigation module allows the user to switch between the simplified and complete versions. (2) The indication and usage module allows the user to click on a specific indication to show the corresponding dosage and usage. (3) The precautions module shows different precautions by pictograms and an icicle plot (h). Specifically for the complete version, (4) the professional drug information module includes an icicle plot representation of drug interactions (i).

Specifically for the complete version, (4) the professional drug information module includes an icicle plot representation of drug interactions (i).

Taxonomy and visualization design framework for OTC drug instructions. (1) Our taxonomy of drug instructions, and in this work, we focus on OTC drug instructions (Categories 1--3, Cat. 1-3). (2) The visualization design framework for OTC drug instructions, which includes four steps (1-4) and specific visualization designs for the most concerning contents (4a-4c). Depending on the category, the specific design of 4a is different.

BibTeX

@article{Fan2026,
title = {Enhance comprehension of over-the-counter drug instructions for the general public and medical professionals through visualization design},
journal = {Computers \& Graphics},
volume = {136},
pages = {104587},
year = {2026},
issn = {0097-8493},
doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cag.2026.104587},
url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0097849326000580},
author = {Mengjie Fan and Katrin Angerbauer and Yinchu Cheng and Yingying Yan and Xiaohan Xu and Tianfu Wang and Michael Sedlmair and Yu Yang and Liang Zhou},
}