COMMUNICATIONS

‘Health Awareness Days’ Give Health Systems a Platform for Communications Outreach

Health awareness or recognition periods—Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October, for example—are an excellent opportunity for health systems to promote their care services to consumers while providing useful information on important medical topics.

In fact, they can become a key cornerstone of a system’s overall marketing strategy simply by planning online health articles and videos, blog and social media posts around these “trending days” that appear on the calendar annually, says Candace Zafirellis, the senior manager of content strategy for Pennsylvania–based Baldwin Publishing, a communications firm that works with hospitals nationally.

“Hospital marketers across the country click on dates on the health observance calendar dozens of times each year, but many of them probably don’t realize all the ways they can use these trending days in events,” Zafirellis notes. “Many of our hospital clients have found these days extremely useful.”

According to the Department of Health and Human Services, health awareness months, weeks and days are national (and sometimes international) events designed to raise awareness of various medical conditions and offer support to those suffering from them. They frequently correspond to health conditions that are common and/or difficult to treat.

In addition to Breast Cancer Awareness Month, events such as World AIDS Day in December and Psoriasis Action Month in August bring important attention to health concerns that affect millions of people, directly or indirectly.

That attention can be leveraged by health systems to coordinate content and/or events that are relevant to their own local communities. SHSMD maintains a calendar of health observances as a resource for hospital marketers.

During a SHSMD Education Sponsored Webinar in January, a marketing communications representative from The Baton Rouge Clinic described how they schedule blog posts on the organization’s website around specific disease states treated by its physicians using the health observances calendar. Located in Louisiana, this 10-location, multispecialty outpatient clinic has more than 150 providers.

The Baton Rouge Clinic’s approach drives traffic to its website and encourages patients to make appointments with their doctors and specialists. The Baton Rouge Clinic also promotes the blog using its various social media channels on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Of note, The Baton Rouge Clinic posts something new on its blog daily, with content provided by Baldwin Publishing but customized to its unique needs. One popular content topic is diet and nutrition, as the clinic has a nutritionist on staff. Posts are scheduled daily, with a target of twice a day.

As an example, for American Heart Month in February, The Baton Rouge Clinic posted heart-healthy recipes from HealtheCooks.com. Clinic specialists then review the content to make sure it provides accurate—and useful—information. Often, they contribute a comment or additional advice that lends credibility and provides readers with even more useful information.

Similarly, Bates County Memorial Hospital in Missouri, a 60-bed facility with four outpatient clinics south of Kansas City, maintains a “Recipe and Wellness” library that patients and members of the community can access on the hospital’s website.

According to Andrea Jackson, the hospital’s marketing and public relations coordinator, Bates uses SHSMD’s health observance calendar for content planning for the library. The library, as the name suggests, features healthy recipes as well as lifestyle tips. (The hospital’s catchment area has high rates of heart disease, diabetes and obesity, as well as mental health conditions.) Again, most of the content is developed by Baldwin Publishing, although Jackson develops some on her own as well.

“There isn’t a large budget for marketing for hospitals like us, and I’m still a department of one,” Jackson says. “I find tools like this save me so much time while also elevating the perception of our hospital in our community. We’re establishing ourselves as experts, sharing vetted content with our community. That’s important, too.”

Bates is also using the same content in quarterly e-Newsletters, again timed with the health observance calendar. Both the e-Newsletter and library articles include links to relevant specialists within the hospital, Jackson says, with the goal of establishing them as “a trusted authority” within their local area. “That’s what we want to nurture with our followers, with our community.”

Like The Baton Rouge Clinic, the Missouri hospital also promotes its health and wellness content on social media, particularly Facebook and, most recently, LinkedIn. Jackson considers social media an “important part” of her day.

“Social media is a conversation with our community, and with social media we have a captive audience,” she says. “The content that we use, especially the health awareness content, is really valuable. We can directly affect our community’s health.”

Bates also sends the library and e-Newsletter content to hospital staff to encourage them to live healthier lifestyles..

“We wanted to provide educational content that is vetted, that I don’t have to spend a lot of time researching,” Jackson explains. “Recently our hospital, like a lot of other hospitals, conducted a community health needs assessment and, probably like a lot of other rural communities, at the top of our needs list or wants list were mental health and obesity and exercise. I see this health library as one part of addressing that.”