Excellence in Communications via Meetings or Congresses

Summary of work

Meeting the needs of patient organisations

SHARE+ has changed the way that UK patient groups view their digital and social media strategies enabling them to harness these channels to better meet the needs of patients. This meeting was the first of its kind, providing patient organisations with access to expertise and information that challenged their thinking on the power and practicality of using social media more effectively to deliver messages and health information. SHARE+ was designed to provide practical advice and support for organisations where knowledge gaps, resourcing and budgetary challenges often make implementation a real challenge. By sharing expertise from within and beyond the healthcare sector, and delivering a programme based around the pre-researched needs of delegates, SHARE+ helped patient organisations think more creatively about their patient interactions, changing their opinions about how they provide access to patient education to improve healthcare standards. The programme and its outcomes demonstrate Roche’s commitment to patients and is the basis of developing long-term relationships between the company and the wider patient support community – beyond product portfolio considerations. Ultimately SHARE+ worked because it achieved a firm commitment from attendees to re-examine and improve their digital and social media strategies and has produced tangible changes that are helping patients.

Judges comments

This programme was a breath of fresh air and a really smart way of building relationships with patient organisations. It creatively looked at how these relationships and patient interactions happened and how digital and social media strategies could be improved. Not only did it over-achieve on its objectives, it also demonstrated long-term commitment to these patient organisations and was very cost effective.

It was well thought out and bold - a new idea that addresses an unmet need with their audience and was, without doubt, the best written entry in this category.