Advancing Health Equity in Rural Communities through Targeted Outreach
With the focus of advancing health equity and meeting the special needs of rural audiences, Livanta recently launched an innovative outreach project featuring its Medicare helpline video. Targeting Medicare beneficiaries, family members, and caregivers, the video promotes Livanta’s Medicare Helpline and the LivantaCares smartphone application. The video also makes brief statements about beneficiary rights to appeal discharges, raise concerns regarding quality of care, and obtain access to advocacy services.
Livanta's new social media toolkit #MyRoleCounts educates people who may not identify as caregivers To determine the effectiveness of the video campaign, Livanta tracked social media followers across its platforms and monitored the number of downloads of the LivantaCares smartphone application. During the video campaign, which spanned three months, Livanta’s monthly average number of new social media followers grew considerably— compared to the prior three months, the number of Livanta’s new social media followers increased 183 percent during the months the video was broadcast. Additionally, Livanta saw an 18 percent increase in the number of average smartphone app downloads per month compared to the prior three months.
“Livanta understands the increasing need to reach Medicare beneficiaries in rural areas through non-traditional messaging campaigns. An important aspect of reaching rural individuals is connecting with them where they are—such as when they are accessing care from their usual healthcare providers,” explained Executive Director Lance Coss.
As a Beneficiary and Family Centered Care-Quality Improvement Organization (BFCC-QIO), Livanta’s ongoing goal is to remove barriers for Medicare beneficiaries, family members, and caregivers who may need to access services of the BFCC-QIO. Providing information in an engaging audio-visual format to a guaranteed audience, Livanta leveraged the vendor’s network of video screens in healthcare provider waiting rooms to increase awareness of the BFCC-QIO program and its associated rights and services for Medicare patients and caregivers.
Livanta’s outreach initiative resulted in its helpline video being broadcast more than 132,000 times across 199 unique physician offices and in 150 unique rural ZIP codes. In addition to being shown in primary care practices, the video was aired in specialists’ offices, including cardiology, rheumatology, and dermatology practices. The video was estimated to have reached nearly one million people, including beneficiaries, family members, friends, or other caregivers who accompanied the patients to their appointments. Playing for a total of six weeks in Fall 2021, the timing of the project coincided with Medicare’s Open Enrollment period and flu season—a time when many patients seek primary care.
Reaching rural beneficiaries with information about Livanta’s Medicare helpline is a challenging endeavor due largely to the geographic isolation of rural areas and the dispersed population density of rural communities. Livanta educated patients and families in their own communities while they received care from their local healthcare providers by airing its Medicare helpline video in physician offices. Livanta continues to explore new ways to identify best practices to reach vulnerable populations, including Medicare beneficiaries living in rural areas.
“Livanta understands the increasing need to reach Medicare beneficiaries in rural areas through non-traditional messaging campaigns. An important aspect of reaching rural individuals is connecting with them where they are—such as when they are accessing care from their usual healthcare providers.”
Executive Director Lance Coss
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