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Promoting Health through the News Media

Researchers and reporters seek common ground in helping the public stay healthy

 

How do you tell a story that didn't happen? How do you tell about the thousands of people who are not on respirators due to polio - or dead from heart disease - because of prevention?

That is a challenge facing successful prevention research. Working with the news media to tell the story was the focus of a recent forum on "Prevention Research in the News: Making Healthy Headlines."

The challenge is not just one of translating technical or scientific language into terms that are familiar to the lay public, said Stephen Linder, Ph.D., interim director of the Institute for Health Policy at The University of Texas School of Public Health at Houston. The health policy institute and Research!America, a not-forprofit public education and research advocacy alliance, hosted the workshop.

A gap exists between the interest of the news media in telling dramatic stories of individuals and the interest of public health professionals in preventing the causes of some of those dramas, Linder said. The purpose of the forum was to help close that communication gap.

Public health professionals and news reporters shared their perspectives on a panel discussion moderated by Helen Vollmer, chief executive officer of Vollmer Public Relations and a member of the UT Health Science Center at Houston Development Board.

Capella Tucker, assistant news director, KUHF-FM Radio - "There's a challenge in radio - being able to translate the information so that it's understandable to the audience. We don't have the benefit of graphs and printed paper to explain on a deeper level. We're relying only on word of mouth - for example, condensing a 400-page document to a minute or a minute-and-a-half story. We really rely on health professionals who can translate that information and communicate it in layman's terms and make it as simple as possible. ... We don't have a specific segment for medical news, so a health story is competing with every other story that's going on."

Krista Marino, health reporter, KPRC-TV - "For TV we need something that's very visual. ... We also rely on patient stories. The emotional side of the story helps people connect with someone on TV. ... Keep in mind that in television you only get to hear it once. ... I'll say to my source, 'Pretend I'm a third grader and talk to me about what you're doing.'"

Susan Tortolero, Ph.D., director, Prevention Research Center, School of Public Health - "I think scientists don't want to promote themselves, and we take working with the news media as kind of self-promotion. I think that's a mistake. ... The other thing is that when a publication is out, it may be some years after the study is completed. So there isn't an opportunity to show the kids participating during the program. We have to be creative and get pictures along the way."

Guy Parcel, Ph.D., dean, School of Public Health, and the John P. McGovern, M.D., Professor in Health Promotion - "We have not developed a way of telling the story about the important work that's being done at the school. As researchers we're very quantitatively oriented. What we haven't done, that I've heard the media talk about, is that we haven't really learned how to translate our stories for people so that people can connect the work that we do in a way that's meaningful to them on a personal level. What we need to do is to not just stop at the numbers, but ask ourselves, 'What does this mean to people out there, and how can we translate in terms that have meaning to them in their personal lives?'"

Lindsay I. Griffin III, Ph.D., former director, Center for Transportation Safety, Texas Transportation Institute, Texas A&M University System - "Before I retired last year, we were frequently asked to interact with the media. In fact one of the phrases that we used was that research findings have very little inventory value. Unless you can get that information out and made known to the public, there is going to be little use made of that information," such as adopting safer behaviors or changing public policies.

Eric Berger, science writer, Houston Chronicle - "In deciding what's newsworthy, we ask: Is it relevant to a large number of people? Is it local? Is it a first? Is a lot of money involved? Are there results? Is it a follow- up to something reported before? Is the story easy to tell?"

All three reporters mentioned the importance of their relationships with public relations staff, in alerting the reporters to stories, helping them arrange interviews and obtaining visuals or other additional information. Summing up their advice for how to give an interview, Berger said researchers need to "translate some of your passion to us."

The half-day forum began with comments by Kenneth L. Shine, M.D., executive vice chancellor for health affairs at the UT System, and keynote speaker Rear Admiral Kenneth P. Moritsugu, M.D., United States deputy surgeon general.

Moritsugu emphasized the importance of health literacy. "We need to close the gap between what health professionals know and what most Americans understand.

"We need to work together - health professionals, government officials, media, others - to provide credible, complete, accurate information," he said. "We need to work with the media to make healthy headlines, to learn as well as to teach, to provide those we serve the best science and the best evidence so that they can make good choices for their health and their safety.

"If you ever doubt that your work matters, consider this: The cost of failing to prevent disease and injury is about much more than dollars and cents. It's about a mother who can no longer provide for her children. It's about a child who can no longer ask a father for a bike. It's about real human costs - millions of American lives lost each year to smoking-related and obesity-related diseases, automobile and other accidents, preventable occurrences. It's about helping people live long and helping people live healthy through prevention."

By Ina Fried, Public Affairs