Colors

Do You Know . . .

Patients with certain medical conditions cannot distinguish between certain colors?

The colors selected for the dosage form, the patient education materials, and the product packaging are critical. Patients must be able to clearly distinguish between their medications and read the patient information. Improper color selection can be a major problem in patient education materials leading to poor patient comprehension and potential medication errors.

Diabetic patients undergoing laser treatment for retinopathy may not be able to tell the difference between blue and green. This means that patient education materials and product packaging for this patient population should not use blue and green together when emphasizing important information.

Elderly patients may not be able to tell the difference between white and yellow. As a person gets older, the lens of the eye tends to yellow. This makes it more difficult to distinguish between white and yellow medications and there is a chance that patients will get their medicines mixed up and not take them correctly. This is a major problem confronting the aging population since so many of their medications are either white or yellow.

Make sure your product, packaging and patient education materials use colors that will be effective with your targeted patient population. Clinical research pertaining to the ability of patients with specific medical conditions to distinguish between colors must be considered.