Case Study · Healthcare · Live
A live, OHIP-covered pain clinic — built to make an anxious patient feel they'd found the right room before they read a single credential.
The Challenge
Nobody books an interventional pain clinic feeling calm. They arrive after failed physio, long specialist wait-lists, and years of being half-believed.
The Pain Clinic is a real, OHIP-covered interventional practice in North York, led by Dr. Dima Rozen — ultrasound- and X-ray-guided injections that calm the source of the pain: nerve blocks, radiofrequency ablation, epidurals, joint and trigger-point injections across the whole body. The medicine is genuinely sophisticated. The problem is almost never the medicine. It's the first ten seconds.
Most clinic sites pick the wrong fear to answer. They go sterile-corporate — hospital-portal blue, stock photos of smiling strangers, a wall of credentials — and a patient in chronic pain reads coldness, not competence. Or they go cheap — a page-builder template that quietly signals "maybe not these people for a needle near my spine."
The site had to carry real clinical authority and feel calm enough that an anxious 40–65-year-old would pick up the phone — and answer the two questions every patient really has: will this hurt, and what will it cost me?
The Approach
The homepage opens on a calm full-bleed film of Dr. Rozen in the imaging suite — a real face, a real room — over a single human promise: "Lasting relief from chronic pain, without surgery." No stock smiles, no wall of logos. The first thing a patient feels is steadiness, and the only two CTAs are the two decisions that matter: show me treatments for where I hurt, and see what OHIP covers.
A clinic that treats the whole body drowns patients in a service list. Instead the site is navigable by where it hurts and what it's called — a treatments library and an A–Z conditions index that route a patient from "my lower back" to exactly the right procedure, in plain language, no medical vocabulary required to start. The body becomes the navigation.
The biggest silent fear is cost. So the site says it plainly, high up: most procedures are OHIP-covered, $0 out of pocket, a family-doctor referral is required, and the wait for a first consult is about four weeks. A dedicated "OHIP & costs" page removes the ambiguity that makes anxious patients close the tab — and built-in accessibility controls (text size, contrast) meet an older audience where they are.
"Will it hurt?" is best answered by seeing. So we produced 15 short procedure explainer films — PRP, radiofrequency ablation, cortisone and facet-joint injections, epidurals, nerve blocks, BMAC and more — each showing calmly what the treatment actually involves. A patient watches before they call, and arrives already understanding. The whole thing is a fast, hand-tuned WordPress build, not a bloated template.
The Work, Live
This is the real site, running in production at thepainclinictoronto.com — the actual hero film below, the real mobile experience, and one of the fifteen procedure explainers we produced.
The real homepage hero film — running live
The live site on mobile
1 of 15 explainer films
A platelet-rich plasma (PRP) explainer — one of fifteen short procedure films we wrote, produced and embedded so patients understand the treatment before they call.
Homepage
A real clinician film and one human promise — steadiness before credentials, with only the two CTAs that matter.
Treatments & conditions
A plain-language treatment finder and an A–Z conditions index that route patients to exactly the right procedure.
OHIP & costs
OHIP coverage, referral process and wait times stated plainly above the fold — the fear that closes tabs, removed.
Video library
Short films for PRP, RFA, cortisone, epidurals, nerve blocks and more — produced in-house and embedded throughout.
Inside the Build
Navigation
A treatments mega-menu that organises the whole body of work into one calm map.
Find by pain
Patients point at where it hurts and get routed to the right treatment — no medical vocabulary needed.
Conditions A–Z
Plain-language condition pages that connect symptoms to procedures.
OHIP & costs
The money question answered plainly — what's covered, the referral, the wait.
Explainer films
Each procedure has a short film so patients see it before they call.
The Outcome
Shipped & maintained
In production at thepainclinictoronto.com — designed, built and kept up to date by the studio.
Explainer films produced
Written, produced and embedded so a patient sees the procedure before they ever pick up the phone.
Cost answered above the fold
The two silent fears — will it hurt, what will it cost — both answered before the patient has to ask.
The site shouldn't say we are experts. It should make a scared person feel they finally found the right room. The brief, in one line
If your patients arrive anxious, the first ten seconds are everything. Tell us about your clinic — we'll reply within one business day.