About
With over 25 years of experience we’ve helped pharmaceutical companies, healthcare brands and trade associations connect and communicate with patients, caregivers, healthcare professionals, payers, regulators, association members and boards to achieve their highest expression and to help people believe in a higher purpose.

Who We Are
ID is a Chicago-based healthcare branding, marketing and digital advertising collaborative focused on delivering strategies, frameworks and tactics to provide exceptional experiences for the biotech, pharmaceutical, medical device and trade association industries.
What We Do
We provide an evidence-based approach to creating healthcare communications that help people grow and organizations achieve results. Blending business consulting, branding, technology, creative solution, culture, and human-factors thinking together we offer a holistic and multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving.
Thoughtful and intentional, WE Bring clarity, creativity, and compliance to healthcare communications – especially where and when the stakes are highest. OUR core competencies include:
1. Simplifying the Complex
We translate dense, technical, or scientific data into clear, accessible content that resonates with patients, HCPs, and stakeholders — without losing nuance or precision.
2. Designing for the End-User (Not Just the Reviewer)
We root every experience, brand, and message in a deep understanding of its audience — patients, caregivers, clinicians, trial coordinators, regulators — to drive action and trust.
3. From Insight to Activation
We conduct and synthesize qualitative and quantitative research, stakeholder interviews, and behavioral analytics to uncover the truths that drive strategy, channel choice, content, and design.
4. Strategic Program & Brand Planning
From global systems to single-campaign activations, we build integrated communications strategies that connect internal teams, brands, patients, and healthcare professionals — across platforms and geographies.
5. Branding That Builds Trust
Whether we’re naming a pipeline asset, creating lexicon messaging systems, designing logos, or developing full brand architectures, we build compliant, compelling identities that speak to people, not just professionals.
- Unbranded campaigns that educate and activate
- Branded systems built for regulatory navigation and emotional resonance
- Trademark-ready design that lives up to clinical rigor
6. Crafting the Patient, HCP, and Trial Experience
From UX wireframes to full UI design, from IRB-approved brochures to trial engagement kits, we create experiences that are human-first — improving enrollment, education, and retention across the study lifecycle.
7. End-to-End Content Creation
Our in-house teams craft content that works across audiences and platforms — always aligned to your tone, regulatory guardrails, and outcomes.
- Digital & social advertising
- Microsites, portals & apps
- Infographics & explainer videos
- Medical writing & corporate comms
- Patient advocacy content
- Presentations, toolkits, pitch decks
- Motion graphics & branded animations
8. Compliance-Conscious Communication Design
Everything we create aligns with regulatory, medical, and legal standards from day one. We build for approval — and for people — simultaneously.
9. Rare, Genetic & Specialized Expertise
We are therapy-agnostic — but mission-specific. Our sweet spot is rare, genetic, and complex diseases where traditional approaches fail. We make invisible conditions visible, and rare stories relatable.
Our Vision
We envision a world where no patient, caregiver, or clinician is left in the dark — where complex science is accessible, brands are built on empathy and ethics, and communication is a catalyst for better outcomes.
At Incognito Design, our vision is to be the trusted partner for organizations navigating the most challenging corners of healthcare — bringing clarity to complexity and humanity to every touchpoint.
Our Mission
At Incognito Design, we exist to make the complex understandable, the invisible visible, and the disconnected human again.
We partner with healthcare, life sciences, and patient advocacy organizations to craft strategic, compliant, and emotionally intelligent communications that inform, inspire, and empower — especially in the rare, the genetic, and the misunderstood.
Our mission is to translate science into stories, data into design, and insights into action — so that the people who need to understand the most are never left behind.
Select Client List

Services
We offer several services and innovative approaches to help inform and guide our work.
Accumulated and honed from our diverse work experience, our time-tested processes, principles, and tools help our clients achieve results that inspire people and companies to greatness.
Let’s Talk if You Need:
• Faster IRB or MLR approval cycles
• Trial recruitment that actually converts
• Unbranded disease education campaigns
• Compliance-forward branding systems
• Insights that go beyond surveys
• UX that patients, clinicians, and regulators can all use• Global systems that feel personal
Strategy
• Audience Insights
• Brand Audit
• Communications Audit
• Content Strategy
• Channel Strategy
• IT Requirements
• Design Planning
• Systems Planning
Branding
• Architecture
• Lexicon
• Naming
• Identity Design
• Standards
• Guidelines
• Activation
Customer Experience
• UX Design
• UI Design
• Advertising
• Photography
• Videography
• Exhibit Design
• Campaigns
• Advisory Board Meetings
• Clinical Trial Communications
• Patient Advocacy
• Practitioner Outreach
• Patient | Caregiver Engagement
Digital
• Information Architecture
• Web Design
• Development
• Application Architecture
• CMS Design
• Website and Microsite
• Landing Page
• Social Media Marketing
• Social Media Banding
Content Creation
• Medical Writing
• Scientific Writing
• Corporate Communications
• Patient Advocacy Support
• Infographics
• Social Media
• Live Action Video
• Motion Graphics
• Screen Writing
• Newsletters
• PowerPoint Presentations
Therapeutic Areas
• Neurology
• Neuromuscular
• Oncology
• Diabetes
• Genetic Disorders
• Rare Disease
• Clinical Trials
Our Team
Leaders should lead the way, but the best leaders lead by example and inspire everyone around them to work towards a bigger vision.
ID leaders are knowledgeable, experienced and passionate – and bring these characteristics to every engagement with our customers, and their customers. Our leaders provide focus, direction and inspiration – and then they get out of the way and let their colleagues do what they do best.

Edward Schweitzer
Founder, Executive Director of Design & Strategy
Edward is a cross-media design director, brand specialist and data insights evangelist. With over 35 years in the design communications industry, he has served in leadership roles for numerous internationally recognized agencies. Edward founded Incognito Design in 1994 and continues to guide ID’s research, strategic development, and creative vision.
Edward has created legal and compliance-based enterprise training programs and internal communications campaigns for highly regulated companies such as Alexion/AstraZeneca Rare Disease, GlaxoSmithKline, Emergent BioSolutions, Altria, and American Express. He has developed global brands, campaigns and business communications for pharmaceutical giants Novo Nordisk, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Ionis, Albireo, Synlogic, as well as clients in finance, food and hard goods, such as Royal Alliance, SunAmerica, AIG, FLOR, the Land of Nod, The Museum of Science and Industry, Shedd Aquarium, and Charlie Trotter’s Foods.
Edward’s work has been recognized by industry award shows from the American Institute of Design, AIGA and Webby’s, as well as trade publications including I.D., Print, How, and Communication Arts.

Patrick Kelly
Strategic Planning & Account Management
For 10 years, Patrick served as a Partner at Method Engine, a Chicago-based boutique digital agency. There, Patrick worked with start-ups to Fortune 500 companies on numerous digital marketing initiatives ranging from website design and development, mobile apps, search marketing, online advertising and social media. Patrick’s clients included Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Thermos, Ingalls Memorial Hospital, Swedish Covenant Hospital and Ford Motor Company.
Previously, Patrick held progressively senior leadership positions at Chicago-based healthcare advertising agencies and marketing firms. With his broad healthcare marketing background and specific experience with digital marketing, Patrick helped clients meet marketing and business objectives and ultimately grow their buisness. Patrick has specific experience in cardiology, oncology, nephrology, home care, information technology, anesthesiology, ambulatory surgery, and orthopedics.

Ken Scholz, PhD
Scientific & Medical Writer
A scientific writer with more than 20 years of experience, Ken has developed and written manuscripts, monographs, slide kits, video scripts, website scripts, and other forms of scientific communication.
Ken has worked with researchers, physicians, textbook publishers, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, non-profit organizations, medical education providers, and government agencies.
Ken’s strength is writing about complex therapeutic areas including aspects related to clinical trial design, interpretation of results, and implications for clinical practice. Ken has deep experience working with top-tier facilities on large-scale projects related to cutting-edge advances in medicine. Many of these projects have required the ability to understand numerous scientific and clinical studies, and to translate those studies into clinical recommendations for specialists.

Peter Burgi, PhD
Anthropologist & Lead Researcher
Peter provides targeted, actionable research findings that fuel creativity and collaboration. During more than 20 years of managing research efforts and showing their practical application, Peter has innovated and implemented strategic solutions on four continents. He has depth of experience in creative learning, market research, strategy, team-building, and intercultural business skills development.
As a qualitative researcher, leader, and anthropologist with a wide repertoire of methodological expertise – ethnography, focus group, in-depth interview methodologies, etc. – he has designed and facilitated high-impact, high-energy interventions that have resulted in robust organizational ROI.

James McDonough
Copy Writer & Brand Strategist
James develops content for strategic communications, branded programs, and marketing campaigns. He has worked with GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, Kohler, Novo Nordisk, Sallie Mae, Akcea Therapeutics, Albireo Pharma, Alexion Pharmaceuticals, The American Association of Diabetes Educators, Astellas Pharma, Centocor Biopharmaceutical, Eisai, Galter Life Center, The International Society of Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, Medline Industries, Northshore Medical Group, and the Swedish Medical Group.
With a background that includes two decades in sales and sales management, James combines real-world business experience with creative problem solving.
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