Education for consumers and healthcare professionals
Medical Minds was asked to develop a program to drive women with stress urinary incontinence (SUI) to doctors’ offices to seek treatment with Renessa®. The campaign we developed with Novasys Medical demonstrates the power of coordinated promotion and education in the introduction of a new treatment modality. The consumer campaign received a Medical Marketing & Media silver award for “Best Use of Direct Marketing to Consumers.”
In the US, 1 in 4 women has SUI, but only half of them talk with their doctors about it, either because they are too embarrassed or because they think SUI is normal after childbirth and with aging—they think they just have to live with it. Despite the fact that SUI has a significant impact on women’s health, causing skin rashes, urinary tract infections, depression, disruption in concentration at work, avoidance of sexual intimacy, and lack of exercise that can lead to weight gain, only 10% to 20% of these women receive treatment. Physicians believe that women want surgery, but in actuality the vast majority of women do not receive treatment because they don’t want surgery. The Renessa program was developed to help bridge this communication gap.
Both consumers and physicians were targeted. Direct marketing channels (print ads, advertorials, radio ads, banner ads, a webinar, a product website) focused on letting women know about Renessa. A core educational slide library supported symposia at the American Urogynecologic Society and other professional meetings as well as patient webinars.
Since the consumer campaign was in the public domain, it generated a buzz among physicians (and their wives) in the local communities. An excellent consumer response was generated in a market test over a 7-month period:
- 16,700 unique visitors to patient websites
- 520 calls to a call center
- 640 calls to doctors’ offices
- Specially designed metrics supported selection of the most cost-effective vehicles and halved the cost per call to doctors’ offices.
Over 600 women completed surveys on patient websites:
- 70% said they were more likely to talk with a doctor about their SUI after visiting the website
- 45% said they were “likely” or “very likely” to seek treatment with Renessa within the next 3 months
- Concerns highlighted in the surveys directed specific educational content.