HSM has seen firsthand the demand for hospice and bereavement support services, serving over 12,000 patients since 2004. With Maine’s growing census of older adults, the number of HSM home patients doubled from 2010 to 2017, and that number is expected to increase even more dramatically over the next two decades.
Seeing the need for increased capacity to meet these growing demands, Hospice of Southern Maine developed a Home Hospice Care Campaign to fund a new Home Hospice Center and needed help promoting the campaign to the public and stakeholders. As HSM’s outsourced marketing department, Fluent was engaged to grow awareness of the campaign and communicate its importance to a widespread audience.
A Stanford study found that 80% of Americans would prefer to die at home, while only 20% actually do. Recognizing that widespread desire, we sought to emphasize HSM’s commitment to home care by demonstrating it visually in a short video promoting the Home Hospice Care Campaign. We worked closely with our videographers and HSM employees to outline key visuals and develop a script that both highlighted the work of a home hospice care provider and demonstrated HSM’s need for a new facility to provide training, support, and space for its care providers and staff.
The video was released at a groundbreaking event for the new Home Hospice Center, which was attended by stakeholders and staff. We gained further visibility for the groundbreaking event by inviting US Senator Susan Collins to attend, in addition to three area television stations as well as the local newspaper.
The video has subsequently been used as a tool to demonstrate the mission of the Home Hospice Care Campaign on the campaign’s website, through email and social media communications, and in related media interviews.