Executive Summary
Introduction: The Complex Reality of Healthcare Marketing
Healthcare marketing often targets idealized personas, but reality paints a more complex picture. Each individual possesses a unique tapestry of preferences and behaviors that can shift with context. Even well-crafted personas must account for physical, emotional, and social factors influencing information consumption and processing. In our digital era, distracted online experiences are commonplace, highlighting the crucial role of print media in enhancing retention.
The overwhelming surplus of digital information can lead to less effective reading experiences for many:
“Currently, the amount of information that is created every two days is roughly equivalent to the amount of information that was created between the beginning of human civilization and the year 2003.” (Front Psychol 2023)
Our online habits—skimming content, jumping between tabs, and constant multitasking—further hinder our ability to absorb complex health information.
The Digital Dilemma: Accessibility and Engagement Challenges
Digital Reading Challenges
- Distractions: Notifications, pop-up ads, and the temptation to multitask can be particularly challenging for individuals with ADHD or similar conditions, making it harder to focus on the content at hand.
- Eye Strain and Discomfort: Prolonged screen time can cause eye strain, headaches, or general discomfort, especially for those with sensory sensitivities or vision impairments.
- Over Reliance on Patients: While accessibility tools can be helpful, the burden falls on patients to access information, have accessibility tools, or ask for assistance.
Populations Left Out by Digital Exclusivity
The cost of not accounting for people who struggle with digital formats is staggering. Considering mental health alone, over 970 million people live with mental health disorders worldwide (WHO 2022), at a cost of $1 trillion annually in lost productivity (WHO 2022). And, those with severe mental health conditions die 10 to 20 years earlier than those without them (WHO 2022).
Accessible health and treatment information could make a significant impact in remediating those numbers. One study on digital interventions for mental health revealed surprising preferences (JMIR Form Res 2022):
- Participants were more willing to use print media over digital interventions.
- More educated respondents and Black respondents were more likely to prefer print over digital interventions.
While there is no single solution, those dealing with mental health challenges demonstrate how investing in print could create substantial impact.
Other groups who could powerfully benefit from having print options available include:
- Age and Education: Older adults with lower education or income often have limited digital health literacy, even when they have access to digital devices. (PLOS Digit Health 2024)
- Income and Access: Lower income people face “practical limitations on accessing technology at work” and have a “lower understanding of how mobile phones can be used to access healthcare services.” (PLOS Digit Health 2024)
- Disability: 62% of adults with a disability own a desktop or laptop, compared with 81% of those without (Pew Research 2021)
- Vision Impairment: 2.2 billion people have vision impairments globally (WHO 2023), which can make screen glare or digital features difficult to navigate.
- Neurodivergence: 15-20% of people worldwide are neurodivergent (Zurich 2023), many of whom struggle with sensory overload online
- ADHD: 8.7 million U.S. adults with ADHD may have limited focus in busy digital environments (JMCP 2021)
- An estimated 5.4 million U.S. adults have Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), a number that’s increasing yearly (CDC 2023, 2024)
Challenges with Digital Content for Various Conditions
- Recall and Cognitive Impairments: Patients with memory disorders may struggle to navigate digital interfaces and remember how to access or revisit information.
- Migraines and Vision Impairments: Bright screens and prolonged digital exposure can trigger or worsen symptoms for those with light sensitivity.
- Digital Literacy or Access: Not everyone has the same level of comfort or proficiency with technology.
- Trauma or Neurological Injury: Patients who have experienced traumatic brain injuries or strokes may have difficulties with processing information, screen navigation, or interacting with digital content.
- Musculoskeletal Issues: Conditions like arthritis or carpal tunnel syndrome can make the physical use of digital devices difficult.
- Mental Health Conditions: Anxiety and depression can affect concentration and motivation, making it harder to engage with and absorb digital information. The constant connectivity of digital devices can also contribute to stress and information overload.
- Epilepsy and Photosensitivity: Flashing images or certain visual patterns on screens can trigger seizures in individuals with epilepsy.
- Preference for Tactile Interaction: Some individuals find that they absorb and retain information better when they can physically interact with materials.
Meeting Patient Needs Through Print at the Point of Care
Consider these facts:
- Simplified print materials could significantly enhance the effectiveness of the annual $14.3 billion spent on ADHD healthcare services (JMCP 2021).
- Sensory processing disorders affect up to 90% of people with ASD and 50-64% with ADHD (Brain Sci 2022), making online concentration particularly challenging.
- The elderly benefit from print materials due to issues like glare sensitivity, information complexity, and mobility difficulties in online navigation.
The best format depends on individual needs, preferences, and challenges. By offering both print and digital options at the point of care, healthcare providers can ensure a more inclusive and supportive approach to reading and learning.
The Print Advantage: Focus, Retention, and Mental Health
Patient POV: The Journey of Print Material
Let's paint a scenario:
A patient visits their doctor, receives a diagnosis, and is handed a brochure. In the rush of the day, they might not give it much thought. But later, as they’re unloading their car at home, they pause to read it. Suddenly, that newly diagnosed manageable pain they’ve been ignoring seems worth addressing. The brochure finds its way to the kitchen counter, where an elderly parent notices it and asks questions. A teenage child sees it and scans the QR code on the back, gaining some insight into symptoms and behaviors. Later, it’s passed to a partner who remarks encouragingly, “You have all these symptoms. Maybe it’s worth looking into.” This simple piece of paper has now initiated important health conversations and helped set expectations within the family.
This scenario illustrates several key advantages of print that stand alone or complement digital strategies:
- Reinforcement and Multimodal Learning: Print materials can reinforce information provided digitally, or prompt further digital inquiry. Combining print and digital caters to different learning styles and demographics.
- Take-home Reference and Shareability: Patients can easily refer to print materials without needing to remember digital locations or search online. Physical materials are easily handed to family members or caregivers.
- Safety: Print materials can be one mode of discretely passing tangible information from person to person with anonymity and leave no digital trail for sensitive information.
- Focus: Print materials encourage undivided attention, reducing mind wandering.
- Tangibility: The physical presence of print materials can serve as a reminder and make information feel more ‘real’.
The Health Anxiety Rx: Reducing the Perils of Online Health Information Seeking
While consulting AI or search engines about health symptoms is common, this practice can overwhelm patients with excessive, often ambiguous, and contradictory information, potentially harming patient outcomes and wellbeing. Online health information seeking (OHIS) frequently leads to option paralysis, misinformation, and increased anxiety in health decisions. A recent study found that “an estimated 40% of frequent health information seekers report an increase in emotional distress” characterized by excessive OHIS patterns and heightened health anxiety. (Digit Health 2024)
Information empowerment, when approached correctly, can boost patient-doctor conversations and drive adherence. The key lies in providing patients and caregivers with focused, reliable information across various touchpoints. Creating a contextual and patient-guided set of resources, both digitally and printed, across points of care can support patients and providers with sought-after information in more palliative ways. This approach could better meet patients’ information-seeking motivations while mitigating the anxiety often produced by unrestricted OHIS.
Focus Under Pressure: The Print Advantage
Research suggests that print may have an advantage for tasks requiring deep comprehension and retention, especially in medical contexts where patients face complex information and various stressors:
- An Elsevier study from 2020 found that digital mediums have been harder on patient learning under pressure. “Participants reading on screen under time pressure scored significantly lower in the reading comprehension test.”
- The same Elsevier study revealed that “in-print readers, but not on-screen readers, mind wandered less” under pressure.
These findings have significant implications for healthcare settings, where patient stress and time constraints are common.
Optimizing for all patient and provider preferences and needs requires marketers to think strategically about how we deliver information, not just what is delivered. As Christy Tetterton, Chief Strategy & Marketing Officer at Formedics, notes:
“We talk about omnichannel tactics for a reason – we know that people (including HCPs) want to interact with content in different forms. We also know that HCPs like and want print for its persistence and that there’s a deeper relationship with content consumed in print than other formats.”
Point of Care as a Safe Harbor
Materials delivered non-digitally at points of care offer a respite from overwhelming and often irrelevant online content. Print materials provide a noise-free environment and can facilitate person-to-person communication, helping practitioners and patients align on care treatments without digital distractions.
The advantages of print:
- Physical Connections: Evokes stronger emotional responses, making content feel more personal and enduring.
- Cognitive Ease: Requires less mental effort, enhancing accessibility for those facing complex situations or fatigue.
- Focused Engagement: Provides a respite from digital overwhelm, allowing patients to absorb information at their own pace.
- Contextual Relevance: Delivers trusted, targeted information at critical points of care, supporting health conversations and decision-making.
The Evolution of Print
Modern print is not simply about shipping boxes of routinely reprinted pamphlets. It can stand independently or complement other media strategies to create messaging that meets patients across increasingly disparate healthcare touchpoints. In one study on patient-centered design, patients “preferred to have both physical and digital copies available” for decision aids (Front Digit Health 2022).
Importantly, print isn’t a relic of the past. The world of print is evolving, leveraging advances to add the power of personalization to print media.
The Future of Print: AI-Enhanced Selection and Personalization
Understanding the Power of Print at the POC
Print is not stuck on the Gutenberg press; healthcare engagement materials continually evolve whether in digital or print. The future will be in innovating how we better use both mediums, and where we bring them together. This is the heart of patient-centered strategy.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) offers an intriguing opportunity to bridge the digital and print worlds, potentially enhancing the selection and delivery of print materials. This hybrid approach combines the tangible benefits of print with the power of AI-driven insights, potentially offering the best of both worlds.
In The Transformative Role of Artificial Intelligence in the Publishing Industry (Fadel 2023), the benefits of using AI for print included:
- Enhanced Personalization: AI can analyze user preferences, reading histories, and learning patterns to recommend the most suitable print materials for individual readers or specific groups.
- Improved Efficiency: AI can quickly sift through large catalogs of print materials, saving time and resources in the selection process.
- Data-Driven Decision Making: Publishers can use AI-generated insights to inform print runs, reducing waste and ensuring popular content remains available.
- Targeted Content Delivery: AI can help identify gaps in print collections and suggest materials to fill those gaps, ensuring a well-rounded selection.
- Predictive Analytics: AI can forecast trends in reader interests, allowing publishers to proactively select and produce print materials that are likely to be in demand.
- Cross-Format Optimization: AI can analyze digital content engagement to inform print material selection, ensuring consistency across formats.
- Accessibility Considerations: AI can help identify print materials that meet specific accessibility needs, ensuring diverse audiences are catered to.
# 1 Print Assets Are Undeniable
- As long as they’re visible and take up a portion of limited space in an environment, print assets face less contextual competition.
- Your patient is not distracted by pop-ups or notifications.
- Print can combat the inundation by creating simple, visually appealing, relevant information that clearly communicates practicable insights and guidance. (Glob Health Sci Pract 2022)
# 2 Personalization is Possible in Print
- Personalized content is more effective and engaging, as it speaks directly to the unique needs and interests of the reader.
- AI-driven personalization is an example of how to ensure print leverages a data-driven approach and allows for dynamic adjustments based on evolving preferences and trends of the doctors and patients at each location.
#3 Guiding Behavior by Narrowing Focus
- Print provides one pathway for creating a very curated approach that could influence behavioral changes simply by increasing the clarity of patient education and its relevance.
- “Choice overload and cognitive overload (when people are presented with too much information and in a way that is hard to understand, respectively) act as barriers as they seek and use information.” (Glob Health Sci Pract 2022)
# 4 Combating Information Overload
- Print can combat inundation by creating simple, visually appealing, relevant information that clearly communicates practicable insights and guidance.
- This applies to both patients and healthcare providers who are increasingly overwhelmed by digital options and resources.
#5 Diversifying Content May Appeal to HCPs
- Healthcare providers have “indicated that it is easier to find information now than in the past with wider access to the internet but, at the same time, they are often overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of information.” (Glob Health Sci Pract 2022)
- Tap into modalities that are palpable, face-to-face, and not overloaded with information that practitioners can see, remember, and pass on to patients with optimal convenience.
Final Points
Print media isn’t just holding its ground in the face of digital dominance—it’s proving to be an indispensable component of effective healthcare marketing. Our exploration has revealed print’s distinct strengths in fostering focus, enhancing retention, and broadening accessibility. These qualities make print an invaluable tool for connecting with diverse patient populations and healthcare providers alike.
For healthcare marketers, the path forward is clear:
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Embrace an omnichannel approach: Combining print and digital strategies maximizes reach and effectiveness.
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Leverage AI for personalization: Advanced technologies can tailor print content to specific audiences and locations.
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Prioritize accessibility: Print is often more accessible for certain populations and conditions.
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Focus on quality: Clear, concise, and actionable print content combats digital overload.
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Stay patient-centered: Offering both print and digital options ensures inclusivity.
By thoughtfully incorporating print media into your strategy, you’re not just disseminating information—you’re fostering more inclusive and impactful healthcare communications that truly connect with your audience. Print isn’t an outdated relic; it’s an evolving, essential component of patient-centered healthcare marketing.
Genuine patient engagement demands a nuanced approach that acknowledges and addresses diverse needs and preferences. By integrating print materials, particularly in crucial settings like the Point of Care, you can significantly boost both patient outcomes and business results.
Print’s ability to deliver personalized, relevant content aligns perfectly with patient expectations. Consider this: a survey of 450 consumers found that 72% valued the relevancy of an offer, with 36% rating it as “extremely” or “very important” (Optimove 2023).
As we navigate the complexities of digital saturation, the solution isn’t to abandon digital strategies, but to complement them with carefully crafted print materials. This balanced approach enables us to reach a broader audience more effectively, ensuring that vital health information is both accessible and retainable for all patients, regardless of their digital proficiency or sensory processing abilities.
