Last Tuesday, I attended the American News Women’s Club’s first Professional Pursuits Series program. Guest speaker of the night, Molly Mahoney Matthews, founder, CEO and
President of The Starfish Group, is a seasoned health communication professional who has seen nearly every corner of the healthcare PR space – she has worked agency life; led communications for a hospital; built, managed and sold her own firm; and is now president of her second communications company.
While Molly was fielding questions after her presentation, I asked her to describe what healthcare communications is in two sentences. Like many PR practitioners, I have a hard time explaining what exactly it is I do each day, so I thought this would be a good question to ask of a woman who has been in the field for 25 years.
Molly gave a brief answer about influencing health behavior, but really recommended that I check out the NIH’s “Making Health Communication Programs Work” for a solid definition of healthcare communications. As a budding health and science PR professional, I knew that I should check out this resource.
The book – commonly referred to as the “Pink Book” – defines health communication as: The study and use of communication strategies to inform and influence individual and community decisions that enhance health. Before employing these communications strategies, I’ve learned that it is important for us to plot out goals and determine what outcomes are reasonable to achieve, especially within a given timeline and budget.
There are some things that we cannot do within a given scope of work, and according to the Pink Book, there are just some things that health communications cannot achieve. Health communications cannot:
- Compensate for inadequate care or access to health care services
- Produce sustained change in complex health behaviors without the support of a larger program for change, like components addressing services, technology and policy changes
- Be effective in addressing all issues or relaying all messages even if topic is complex or controversial or if the audience may have preconceptions
But, health communications can increase awareness of rare disease states. And we can prompt patients to take action. And we can do everything from increasing support for health services to demonstrating health skills to advocating for health policies. We can also show the benefit of behavior change, refute common misconceptions and strengthen organizational relationships.
That sounds like a lot more “can’s” than “cannot’s.” That also sounds like health care communicators can really make a change and improve health outcomes. And that is why we come to work each day.