More and more hospitals are producing newsletters for their medical staff, referring physicians, and/or potential referrers, including 80+ percent of larger hospitals. Between 2004 and 2007, the percentage of all hospitals engaging in this form of communication rose from 55 to 64, almost all of them produced in-house, according to a survey by the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development.
The 2007 edition of the society’s By the Numbers: Benchmarking Study on Healthcare Marketing, Communications, and Strategic Planning—Budgets, Staffing, and Structure shows that the majority of these newsletters, 76 percent, are monthly or quarterly; 20 percent come out bimonthly and only 5 percent are weeklies.
For more information about the study, or to take the current survey online, visit SHSMD at http://www.shsmd.org/shsmd/aboutus/BTNSurveyJump.html.