WASHINGTON, D.C. - If you encourage hospital leaders to take a position on the controversial `value' issue, you will earn CEO-level respect.
By spearheading efforts that help executives fill the gaping community void of preventive healthcare rather than simply managing sickness, communicators can grab a seat at the executive decision-making table.
This subject was tackled at the Public Relations Society of America's Health Academy conference held here earlier this month.
To develop healthcare value through strategic community initiatives, Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis, Ore. launched a "social accountability budget" in 1995 that is managed by the PR department.
The $270,000 budget which is managed by Julie Jones Manning, Good Samaritan's director of development and community relations, is earmarked for "creating, demonstrating and quantifying community value."
The partnerships that evolved from the social accountability budget include a Healthy Start program that provides follow-up home nursing care for parents of newborns and a Lincoln School Healthcare outreach effort to install nurses in local grammar schools.
The community efforts have helped Good Samaritan win support from physicians, employees and payers, says Larry A. Mullins, Good Samaritan's CEO.
To generate CEO-level respect and support, Mullins advises communicators to:
Convince the CEO that PR can bring a community perspective to the executive decision-making process
Regularly update executives about the community's health status and identify strategic areas of improvement; and
Make it clear that PR is leadership's best ally in battling negative community perception and promoting the hospital's value-based successes when they occur.
On The Partnering Front
Forging value-based healthcare alliances also requires overcoming some tough marketing challenges, according to Michael D. Bardin, senior director of ScrippsHealth who also spoke at the conference.
The San Diego-based community-based health plan's recent 50/50 partnership with physicians in 1994 required each organization to re-evaluate their market position on competitive purchaser and payer consolidations.
To work through these issues, the newly formed coalition, launched a community benefits and services department that coordinated health education programs, realigned outreach services and enhanced government relations programs.
And making non-profit/for-profit collaborations work requires more upfront strategic planning and risk-benefit analyses, says Steve Delfin of Delfin & Associates, a Washington, D.C-based consulting firm.
Delfin has worked on partnerships involving the Children's Medical Network Telethon and the American Red Cross and Burger King..
Providing a risk-benefit checklist that helps PR pros answer "Is the partnership really worth it?", Delfin fired of a list of pointers, including:
- Assessing the impact of the collaboration on constituents.
- Evaluating whether each party's objectives can be met without jeopardizing core values.
- Determining whether there is a "natural affinity."
- Understanding fully the ethical/legal implications.
- Determining whether the partnership will cheapen or devalue the organization's community image. (Good Samaritan, Julie Jones Manning, 541/757-5172; ScrippsHealth, Michael D. Bardin, 619/678-6893)