Superwoman Syndrome

CEO and Founder of Medikidz Kim Chilman-Blair has created the world’s first series of medical comics which are proving a welcome resource for parents

Any parent can understand the difficulty of attempting to explain a health issue to their child. Often a diagnosis is difficult to comprehend even for an adult and the child is left confused and scared by the medical procedures and treatments that they must undergo.

Dr Kim Chilman-Blair saw this first hand as she was unable to provide children with resources to help educate them about their new diagnoses or medicines - in their language, at their level.

“While I was studying as a medical student, I was helping a young patient who had epilepsy,” Kim explains. “While I was talking to him, I realised that he didn’t understand what epilepsy was, and moreover, there was no information anywhere which could explain the condition in language that he could understand. I saw so many scared children who had a medical condition, but couldn’t grasp what it actually meant. I really believe education is empowerment, so taking away the complex medical terms and making it clear goes a very long way to making a child feel more confident and better equipped to handle whatever condition they may have.”

While studying for a Masters in Entrepreneurship at the University of Otago and working full time as a paediatrician, Kim started writing stories that would eventually become the world's first series of medical information comics for young people. After winning a $20,000 entrepreneurship challenge, she moved over to South West London with her colleague Dr Kate Hersov, to fully establish the company.

“We decided on London and the UK purely for geographical reasons. It is the ideal location for us to create our European and global network. We go back to New Zealand all the time to see friends and family and yes, we do miss it, but we know it’s there when we get home sick homesick!”

The 'Medikidz' are a gang of five larger-than-life superheroes from outer space, which are each specialists in different parts of the body. The characters are designed to be fun and appealing to young people in order to be able to entertain, as well as educate them about serious medical issues. They are destined to become characters with whom children can relate, and befriend.

The Medikidz characters live on 'Mediland' - a living, moving planet shaped just like the human body. The children are taught about their own body by going on a personal tour through Mediland.
 
“The Medikidz characters were developed to have global appeal, which we find works in most countries. There are obviously cultural differences when working in certain parts of the world, which we are sensitive to and take in to account when writing the content and developing the artwork. To make sure we are appealing to the right demographic within that culture we work with Medikidz Cultural Liaisons in every country where we operate to ensure we have the right cultural touch points to make them as compelling as possible for any audience. 
Once the content has been created, we sit down with the Medikidz Youth Advisory Board, which is a panel of 8-16 year olds, who are the ultimate judges of the success of the book. They tell us where characters might not work, what they find exciting; which areas they may still find confusing, and we take everything they say on board and go back to make changes. The Youth Advisory Board is our most important stage in the process and it is from this that we feel confident we are creating something relevant that young people from 6- 15 years old will read and find interesting.”
 
Credibility is the cornerstone to the Medikidz offering - professional medical writers and doctors write all the content, which is subsequently peer-reviewed by leading consultants in each respective field. Medikidz also gains the endorsement of established and well-regarded medical institutions, foundations and spokespeople. Medikidz has established a Medical Advisory Board, consisting of dozens of the world's preeminent physicians, as well as a Youth Advisory Board, a group of young people aged 6-16 years old, affected by illness, whose voice and opinion help to shape the direction of Medikidz.

As well as the 25 current comic book titles on paediatric conditions, Medikidz have also produced titles relating to adult conditions, so that a parent/loved one, when faced with a diagnosis, has somewhere to turn to help them explain it to their children. Already published is "What's Up With Mum? Medikidz Explain Breast Cancer" and "What's Up With Dad? Medikidz Explain Melanoma" and next in this series will be, "What's Up With Grandpa? Medikidz Explain Alzheimer's Disease", with Colon Cancer, Parkinson's, Multiple Sclerosis and Schizophrenia to follow.

Since launching in September 2009, Medikidz has distributed over 1,800,000 comic books globally in 40 different countries around the world, in 25 different languages.
“Though we won’t be happy until we have Medikidz in every language, in every country!”
 
www.medikidz.com
 
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