(The Eurographics Association, 2025) Mlitzke, Sophie; Mittenentzwei, Sarah; Preim, Bernhard; Meuschke, Monique; Garrison, Laura; Krueger, Robert
This paper examines how basic interaction techniques for medical data, such as clipping planes and manually adjusting the transparency of surfaces, commonly used in professional medical visualizations, can be adapted for medical stories intended for non-expert audiences. We implemented two case studies, involving liver and lung tumors. The goal was to effectively communicate critical aspects such as tumor size, position, and lymph node involvement to our target group. In a mixed-methods online study involving 26 participants, we examined how these techniques facilitate understanding and engagement. Results suggest that transparent surfaces and guided animations, followed by interactive exploration, were beneficial for communicating nested anatomical structures. While promising, these findings are preliminary and not conclusive; further studies with larger samples and real target audiences are needed to validate the effectiveness of these techniques. Our work provides initial design insights for making complex medical content more accessible through interactive storytelling.