Patient Insider
Health Union
Health Union’s Patient Insider, which launched in January 2022, showcases the emotional and detailed story of a patient “insider” who is eager to share their health journey in a way that can help others. The compelling story of their personal experience is authentic and emotional, and engages people on a broad, human level.
Original content, touting first-person experiences of people living with chronic conditions has been a hallmark of Health Union’s success. With the acquisition of WEGO Health in June 2021, the companies wanted to combine their strengths to deliver value to patients and industry.
The goal of Patient Insider is to marry WEGO Health’s expansive patient leader network with the highly qualified audiences and relevant content within Health Union’s communities. Each Patient Insider feature lives within the relevant condition community website. It tells the unique story of their personal journey, including experiences with diagnosis; treatment; and various emotional, mental health, and quality of life concerns. To increase relatability, each feature includes real imagery of the individual patient leader, a video and recommended readings that are personally selected.
Every aspect of Patient Insider is part of a comprehensive story of the patient that’s told in their voice. In addition, the layout is styled to look like a scrapbook or journal with real imagery of the individual patient leader, which makes it even more personal and easy to digest. Whether newly diagnosed, or living with a condition for 20 years, the brief introduction establishes who the person is and where they are on their health journey.
Every subsequent element shares another glimpse into their experiences. They include:
- A personal video
- “My Reading List,” a list of recommended articles they’ve selected based on how well they resonate with their experiences or perspectives
- Polls, also written from their perspective, asking about personal experiences of the community
From a business perspective, this is different from other approaches because the content is guided by the patient and their own story. Industry partners who advertise through the Patient Insider feature secure exclusivity, and their advertisements run adjacent to story-focused content that is highly relevant, engaging, and relatable. Health Union also works with the featured patients, leveraging their social media networks and followers to drive more of the target audience to the Patient Insider pages.
The first Patient Insider article featured a psoriasis patient leader and was published on PlaquePsoriasis.com in early January 2022: https://plaquepsoriasis.com/patient-diagnosis-story.
The second featured a psoriatic arthritis patient leader and was published on Psoriatic-Arthritis.com in late January 2022: https://psoriatic-arthritis.com/overwhelmed-guilt.
More Patient Insider programs are slated to launch in the coming months within other Health Union communities.
Results from the first two weeks of the psoriasis Patient Insider campaign indicate that visitors are highly engaged with the story, spending close to three minutes on the page. Meanwhile, the clickthrough rate is roughly three times the industry benchmark. With two launched and a third one in development for another community, early indicators suggest that Patient Insider will continue to garner success as a compelling storytelling initiative that truly puts the patient at the center of the health journey.
