Awareness-raising by the DH campaign,

This was brought to you from


Samantha May

Head of Patient Support Services



The Hepatitis C Trust

27 Crosby Row,

London SE1 3YD

Telephone: 020 7089 6220

Fax: 020 7089 6201



Helpline: 0845 223 4424

(from 10.30 - 16.30pm Monday to Friday, all calls are confidential)

Web: www.hepctrust.org.uk

HELPLINE NEWS
As the fifth year of the helpline service draws to
a close we have now spoken to over 10,000
people since our inception. Initially many of the
calls were from people who had had hep C for
some time who were just glad to have found
somewhere they could get friendly support by
simply talking to fellow patients. However, as
awareness grew, both of hep C generally and the
services we provide, we then increasingly had
enquiries about how to access treatment –
many patients, despite being diagnosed for
some time, were not even aware of the
treatment – or did not realise they were eligible
for it. Many more had been given a negative view
that it would not work for them (based on the
early treatments that were available) and did not
realise that with the arrival of pegylated
interferon and ribavirin that their chances of
success may have been increased considerably.
Indeed many were not even be regularly
monitored by hospitals as they had been left
with the idea that nothing could be done.
Callers also wanted to know how best they
could change their lifestyles to slow down
progression of the disease or manage their
symptoms better, whether through improving
their diet, exercise, or the use of
complementary therapies.
Now, enquiries are much more varied – there is
a lot more interest (but still unfortunately
confusion!) from the general public on how
exactly hep C is transmitted and many more
from patients who are recently diagnosed but
happily are getting increasingly signposted to
us for information and support from their GPs
and specialist teams.
The majority of our callers are patients now are
in their late forties to sixties, many of whom
will have been living with hep C for three to four
decades, and their enquiries are increasingly
about consequent diagnoses of cirrhosis, liver
cancer and other longer term complications of
having hep C.
With new treatments on their way soon,
following promising results in recent clinical
trials, more and more people are now looking
to get treated, or retreated and concern and
awareness of hepatitis C is starting to rapidly
increase as a result of not only our work here,
the advent of more patient groups around the
UK, the forthcoming appointment of the liver
czar, the Department of Health and work
undertaken by the World Hepatitis Alliance,
and we are therefore anticipating a significant
increase in demand in the New Year.
With this in mind, in early 2010 we will be
looking to recruit volunteers, with excellent
interpersonal skills, familiar with using
computers and living in the London area (we
are based at London Bridge) and who have
long term experience of living with hepatitis C,
either treated or untreated, who are willing to
offer support and share their experiences, as
well as provide up to date and accurate
information to a variety of callers.
We are also looking to employ someone fulltime,
with good administrative skills to assist
the Head of Patient Support in facilitating our
range of support services and this will also
involve working on the helpline directly.
If you are interested and would like to get
involved please contact Sam on 020 7089
6220 or email to helpline@hepctrust.org.uk
DH hepatitis C awareness campaign
2008/2009 and 2009/2010
The 2008/09 campaign was, for the first time, targeted at ex-intravenous drug users (ex-IDU’s) and
the South Asian population, using a fully integrated approach consisting of TV, radio, print and online
advertising, and PR and outreach work.
The “Get Tested, Get Treated” creative was
designed to influence the ex-IDU target audience
by describing previous behaviour in a nonstigmatising
way that would enable them to
identify themselves as being at risk. It then
encouraged them to seek advice about getting
tested, either by visiting their GP or finding out
more information via the web and phone line calls
to action. There was a separate campaign ‘The
more you know, the better’ for the South Asian
population.
The results were encouraging, with research
showing 60 per cent of ex-IDU’s saying they knew
a great deal or a fair amount about hepatitis C.
Pre and post campaign research showed an
increase of 10 per cent in awareness of the
campaign amongst the South Asian audience,
and 13 per cent of the general public had also
seen or heard publicity and advertising related to
the campaign.
In terms of response to the campaign, TV
advertising for the South Asian population drove
almost half of the calls to the campaign’s
Hepatitis C Information Line, and the use of paid
for “digital search” was shown to be the biggest
driver of overall response to the campaign’s
website, www.nhs.uk/hepc – with about 75,000
visits during the campaign period.
As a result of the evaluation of the 2008/09
campaign, the 2009/10 campaign strategy has
been adjusted and relatively ineffective channels
such as outdoor and regional press advertising
removed, and more resources allocated, for
example, to digital search and radio advertising.
In addition, the press advertisements will be
changed from a full to a half page format, to
increase frequency and allow for two bursts of
advertising starting in October 2009 and
February 2010. This should make the campaign
more accessible, effective and efficient, and
increase understanding of the disease amongst
the target groups.
We have been consulting a multi-agency
stakeholder group, including The Hepatitis C
Trust, about the campaign strategy for
2009/2010 and will be seeking their views on
the campaign plan shortly.
Awareness-raising by the DH campaign, the NHS,
and other stakeholders, including the third sector,
is helping to sustain an increase in hepatitis C
testing, diagnosis and treatment.