A Powerful PSA About Advance Care Planning

Lisbet Byler

May 4, 2017

MAKE’s Senior Producer, Allen Clements, recently published a LinkedIn article about our work with Reading Health System and our process behind the PSA we produced for National Healthcare Decisions Day. 


Reading Health System has been an amazing partner for MAKE films. We’ve been able to apply our staff’s history of working on healthcare projects and assist a client who is completely bought into the need for consistent and effective multimedia communication both internally and to their healthcare consumer-base.

About a month ago, we were approached by the health system to devise a PSA for National Healthcare Decisions Day. We immediately started brainstorming what such a piece could look and feel like. In the past few years, I’ve had quite a bit of experience working on projects involving proxy selection, advance directive and other aspects of end of life planning. I was very inspired by this project and suggested that we should be bold and go for a dramatic concept.

Not speaking specifically about our client or even the healthcare industry in general, creative advertisers work in an extremely risk-mitigated business environment. This is true now more than ever. If it’s “dangerous,” we are often asked to make it “safe.” Well, safe isn’t always effective. We needed to get people’s attention and even more importantly, get them to take immediate action.

There are a number of misunderstandings about Advance Care Planning. Many people don’t know what it is. Some people think it’s for the elderly. Others don’t have any strong opinions on what happens to them if they can’t speak for themselves so they think it doesn’t matter. We wanted to try to address many of these misconceptions in a single communication.

The Advance Care Planning task force at Reading Health knew how important this information was and accepted our challenge to create an intense, jaw-dropping scene painting a picture of what avoiding advance care planning might look like.

We were driven by the idea that many people are aware of the need for planning but never start the conversation. Why don’t they start the conversation? Well, life gets in the way but, really, it’s about priorities. When faced with a sudden accident or illness, we don’t get the chance to re-assess or re-organize our priorities. It’s too late. And that’s what led to “Last on the List,” a PSA made by MAKE on behalf of the Reading Health System for National Healthcare Decisions Day. We hope it inspires you.

Watch the final product below.

Please take advantage of the free advance care planning documents offered by Reading Health System. Just use the information at the end of the film to get started on a path to peace of mind for those who love and depend on you.


View the original LinkedIn article here.


 

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