Healthcare marketers are grappling more and more with ways to make their messages more "readable" and "easily understood."
Consumer confusion - from choosing the right health plan to understanding hospital consent forms - is at an all-time high, leading many healthcare advocacy groups to create programs that make healthcare information more accessible both culturally and linguistically.
Targeting the full spectrum of healthcare consumers-from Medicaid and Medicare recipients to employer-based health plan beneficiaries - organizations like The Keenan Group (Columbia, Md.), the National Consumers League (Washington, D.C.) and the Health Rights Hotline pilot (Sacramento, Calif.) have recently surfaced with compelling consumer campaigns aimed at diluting complicated healthcare information.
Although these programs are consumer-focused; they are not competing with health plans and providers through direct-to-consumer marketing campaigns. Instead, they rely most on managed care systems to get the word out.
Hotline Answers Consumers' Call
"We don't want this to be an 'us against them' situation, but an opportunity to develop collaborative relationships," said Peter Lee, project director for the recently launched Health Rights Hotline, a three-year pilot project for the Center for Health Care Rights. The hotline, which serves the dual purpose of being an information/assistance resource for healthcare consumers in Sacramento and a central data collection source for managed care consumer feedback, is promoting itself exclusively through managed care channels.
Funded by three charitable organizations: The California Wellness Foundation, The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and the Sierra Health Foundation, the $1.2 million project is the first independent advocacy hotline in the nation and uses 13 trained counselors who speak five languages to answer consumer questions, provide referrals and resolve disputes with health plans, medical groups and other healthcare organizations.
To promote the hotline, a conservative direct mail effort will target physicians, health plans and systems, consumer groups and regulatory agencies throughout the year. (An initial drop of 5,000 direct mail packets at $1.50 each were mailed out last month.) Expected to generate between 1,000 to 4,000 calls a month, the hotline can be a tremendous resource for hospital-based patient marketing efforts, according to Lee. "Consumers are looking for who is on their side, any provider that provides them with key referral sources for their questions will come out looking like patient advocates (as opposed to managed care bureaucrats)."
Breaking Language Barriers
| Creating Clarity
To create easily understood healthcare information, low literacy experts suggest:
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Since consumers are playing a more proactive role in their healthcare choices, "they need to understand the rules of the road," said Linda Gollodner, president of the National Consumer League, which commits about a third of its consumer campaigns to healthcare efforts. Its latest healthcare mission has been to make popular over-the-counter (OTC) medical information more understandable for Spanish-speaking Americans with six translated brochures.
Launched last month, the first three brochures, on pain, cough-and-cold, and children's medication, go beyond simple Spanish translations to address cultural considerations as well with appropriate word-graphics illustrations, large-size type and cultural dietary considerations, according to Gollodner. (The next three brochures-asthma, allergy and antacid medicine-will hit this fall.) Funded by the Nonprescription Drug Manufactures of America, this $70,000 project also targets healthcare organizations like community centers, hospitals and Hispanic healthcare groups for its consumer distribution.
On the prescription side, NCL will work with the National Patient Safety Foundation on its "Mistakes and Errors" campaign (estimated fall launch) that will arm consumers with a comprehensive checklist of questions to ask physicians and pharmacists about prescription drugs. Ideal for any hospital-based patient marketing efforts, these pamphlets "will enhance patient-focused images that make patients feel like people instead of a number or chart," said Gollodner.
'Soup to Nuts' Approach
Low Literacy Advocacy Groups*
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Creating literacy-sensitive campaigns requires a lot more than using short sentences and three-syllable words, according to low literacy specialist Jann Keenan who heads up The Keenan Group. But it doesn't require a complete campaign overhaul either. From a one-time project to a full-blown "soup to nuts" campaign, Keenan works with healthcare organizations on creating easy-to-understand printed communications like brochures, discharge papers, consent forms and newsletters. Having done projects for the National Institutes of Health, Procter & Gamble and the Centers for Disease Control, The Keenan Group uses a five-point communication approach called the Readability Plus Model to critique current healthcare campaigns, conduct pre-testing and focus groups, then make customization recommendations.
Citing that 47 percent of American adults read too poorly to understand most printed health information like consent forms, which are usually written at a college reading comprehension level or above, Keenan says that hospitals can make relatively simple communications adjustments to ensure that key messages are getting across especially to target groups.
At the top of the list is developing culturally-sensitive messages. "To reach African Americans, marketing campaigns have to do more than use Kente cloth colors, they have to address distinct behaviors of that group," said Keenan, who highlights preventive care and follow-up treatment as key areas that hospitals should focus on to enhance communications. (Health Rights Hotline, 916/551-2184; National Consumer League, 202/835-3323; The Keenan Group, 410/480-9716)