What’s the best way for pharma to reach patients in Europe?
pharmafile | October 17, 2010 | Feature | Medical Communications |
by Francis Namouk, Streaming Well
Lisa first noticed the pain and stiffness in her hands when she was unable to hold heavy pots or to open a jar while preparing a family meal. She began to take over the counter painkillers and anti-inflammatories and chalked it up to the beginning of old age. When her symptoms worsened she consulted her GP and was prescribed a stronger analgesic. After several months, the pain had spread throughout her body. Unable to type due to the intense pain, she had to leave her job. Lisa was eventually diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, but not before her joints were irreparably damaged by the disease – damage that could have been prevented by timely treatment.
Lisa’s story, while fictionalized, is based on the experiences of countless patients with hard to diagnose conditions. In Lisa’s case she had only one source of medical information – her GP – what if she had had others? What if Lisa had input her symptoms into an internet search engine? Would that have changed the outcome?
The informed and empowered patient is increasingly the norm in GPs offices in the UK. Physicians report that patients as well as their carers routinely come for appointments brimming with information gleaned from internet searches. According to Google half the UK population use their search engine to find health information with 12 healthcare keyword searches being performed every second.
Even as consultation times across Europe fall below 15 minutes, these informed patients demand that their GPs include them in decision-making and are more willing to challenge them. New thinking has emerged in which the doctor patient consultation is regarded not as a one way communication but an informed exchange between experts – the physician is the medical expert and the patient is an expert in their own experiences and condition. Patients know about their treatment options and even request medications based on online searches.
Given this shift in patient empowerment, it is more important than ever to provide credible accurate online health information. Unfortunately there is an abundance of erroneous advice on the web. If Lisa had searched online for the symptoms “joint pain and stiffness” the first hit on Google is for a company selling “natural supplements” which states that joint pain is not caused by arthritis! As users increasingly go online seeking health information there is an industry interest to provide credible engaging content through trusted media.
The truth is, producing good quality content is expensive. Even then, people tend not to trust it if it is obviously funded by a pharmaceutical company. So there is the problem, it is in pharma’s interest to ensure that patients can find accurate healthcare resources online but the current methods they use – standalone websites and pages – are not credible in the eyes of patients. How then to create accurate, high quality healthcare content that patients will engage with online?
Engagement – the art captivating a person’s interest – is essential to effective messaging and one of the most engaging media on the internet is video. To put matters into perspective, YouTube is the second largest online search destination online after Google, ahead of Yahoo. In January 2009 there were 29.6 million video streams in the UK, and 80% of UK Internet users watched video*. Health is the 5th largest searched category on YouTube.
Video can also be an effective tool for communicating with people who are not native English speakers or aren’t able to slog through dense and confusing text. Multilanguage videos overcome cultural and language barriers.
As an added advantage for the suppliers of content, videos lend themselves to the use of analytic tools that precisely monitor which videos are being watched and for how long. We can see exactly which videos a viewer watched and exactly the moment when they clicked away. There is no other content available that facilitates this level of detailed feedback to a content producer.
In the case of Lisa, the knowledge came too late. Early diagnosis of Rheumatoid Arthritis is necessary to preventing irreversible joint damage. This is a relatively rare condition and many GP’s will only see one or two cases a year. Because of this, it is extremely hard to diagnose so by the time patients are referred to a rheumatologist, it is too late to prevent irreversible joint damage.
The National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society is experimenting with a solution. They will soon launch an informational video on their website empowering patients to insist on being referred to a rheumatologist at the first sign of joint inflammation. A campaign like this aligns goals for both advocacy groups and pharmaceutical entities. Pharma has the economic ability to create excellent content while Patient Advocacy groups like the NRAS have the credibility to ensure that people hear the message.
*Sources: Global Web Index, Nielsen, and ComScore
Article taken from The Digital Pharma Guide, Click here for the e:edition
