The familiar practice of giving new moms goodie bags filled with tchotchkes like diaper samples, product coupons and brochures recently came under fire and led one hospital to overhaul its policy. What is at the heart of this latest debate is whether hospitals are giving patients an "assumed endorsement" of the products included in the gift bags. For the first time, the American Hospital Association is considering what it's position should be on the issue.
Regardless of where your hospital stands on this issue, you should be prepared to defend that position to the media and patient advocates with well-thought out ammunition by determining:
- how your hospital handles giveaways;
- what the giveaways generally consist of; and
- what the overall patient feedback is.
When a patient of George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C. received her free items, she took offense at the credit card applications, life insurance brochures and chocolate bars she was given. She complained to her employer, consumer advocate Ralph Nader, who is now urging the AHA to oppose the practice. She also wrote a letter of complaint to the hospital, whose CEO Phillip S. Schaengold, has agreed to replace the giveaways with neutral non-company-specific gifts.
Amy Pianalto, who heads the hospital's PR and marketing department, refused to discuss the decision or how it is now handling the gift bags. But other hospitals HPRMN spoke with were quite forthcoming about the popularity of giveaways. The key is making sure the products your hospital is giving away do not undermine patient education efforts. For instance, if your hospital emphasizes to new moms the importance of breast feeding, giving away baby formula can send a mixed message.
To avoid sending the wrong message about its pro-breast feeding stance, the University of Chicago Hospitals discontinued the practice of giving away baby formula and product literature a few years ago, says Sharon Broderick, the hospital's director of women's care services.
But Catherine Dahlem, head nurse manager for University Hospitals in Cleveland, says the gift bags are extremely useful for new parents, particularly those who have not had a chance to shop for some of the items offered in the bags. Dahlem likens the gift bags to the coupon packets people receive in the mail or welcome wagons for new neighbors, "[New moms] pick and choose what they want and throw the rest away," she says.
University Hospitals works with about three sampling companies, including American Baby Baskets and American Sampling, which was recently purchased by Snyder Communications.
Although Dahlem gets weekly requests from companies to include their products in the giveaways, she sticks to using the sampling companies that provide nationally known items as opposed to local ones. She says local products are more likely to be perceived as endorsements.
And if there's a product that her department wants taken out of the gift bags, Dahlem says the sampling company will exclude it.
As long as the hospital monitors the content of what goes in the gift bags, patients view them as goodwill gestures and not hospital endorsements.
What also helps to bolster this practice is informing patients that their names or contact information are never given to the companies included in the gift bags, says Dahlem.
(University Hospitals, Catherine Dahlem, 216/844-1630, University of Chicago Hospitals, Sharon Broderick, 773/702-6312, AHA, 202/626-2284)