We’re honored to take home Best Science & Technology Video with Northwell Health in the 2024 Ragan Communications Video, Virtual & Visual Awards for our Double Neural Bypass Campaign.
MediaSource was founded in 1998 with a vision to lead the visual revolution in public relations. Throughout the years, we’ve had the honor of garnering national media attention for some of the most important stories in healthcare via video storytelling. This story makes that list. Watch one of the award-winning videos associated with this campaign, and read more about our work, below.
Situation
In a first-of-its-kind clinical trial, bioelectronic medicine researchers, engineers and surgeons at The Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research at Northwell Health successfully implanted microchips into the brain of a man living with paralysis, and developed artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to re-link his brain to his body and spinal cord. This double neural bypass forms an electronic bridge that allows information to flow once again between the man’s paralyzed body and brain to restore movement and sensations in his hand with lasting gains in his arm and wrist outside of the laboratory. By producing bioelectronic medicine innovation, like this double neural bypass, disease and injury could one day be treated with our own nerves without costly and potentially harmful pharmaceuticals.
Knowing the importance of this first-ever medical breakthrough, but also understanding the technical verbiage that comes with it, Northwell Health partnered with MediaSource to develop a multifaceted video campaign to promote their innovation and expertise in neurology and bioelectric medicine.
Strategy
MediaSource knew that this story would require a creative visual storytelling campaign that included different styles of video for different outlets and audiences. This would include a long-format video, a news-style video, shorter social media videos and more. All videos would need to break the technical information down into consumer-facing content.
Our Creative team identified key visuals in the story, featured individuals, visual recommendations and interview questions. We started documenting everything with the patient, Keith Thomas, before the surgery, then monitored his progress for months looking for strategic moments to build the story around.
The complex topic summary was simplified to the following: “A paralyzed man has regained lasting movement and feeling in his hands using the world’s first “double bypass” approach, which not only reconnects his brain to his body, but also to healthy parts of his spinal cord, allowing him to move his hands using only his thoughts.”
Our Creative team identified an iconic moment for the video campaign that would visually capture the story and increase exposure. We decided to highlight a “big moment” of movement and sensation with Keith opening his hand and his sister reaching out to hold it, so that he can react to being able to feel her touch once again.
Execution
Our team captured footage, interviews and b-roll before surgery, during surgery in the OR and documented key milestones throughout the patient’s progress, including the identified key moment of Keith being able to feel his sister’s hand.
Included in the video campaign was distribution via a Multimedia Newsroom customized to Northwell Health. This multimedia digital delivery system offered high quality, downloadable multimedia elements to journalists in various formats. This newsroom housed all of the multimedia assets.
Our Creative team created variations of the key video for news media (across broadcast, digital and print), social media (Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram) and other digital channels. This included:
- Long-format video for digital outlets and company-owned channels for thought leadership
- An edited news package video targeted to TV and online media (with and without titles)
- Extra b-roll for media
- Social media videos for company-owned channels
To amplify the video campaign, we created a strategic list of top media outlets, and one-by-one, worked to secure one national print/online and one TV network exclusive.
After the exclusives landed with two top-tier outlets, Northwell Health hosted a press conference and the team began expanding media outreach using the video and multimedia news release. The release timelines were strategically executed around the 3-year anniversary of Keith’s accident and the two exclusive media crews were with him on the actual anniversary to capture elements before their story release later that month.
Results
The exposure of the visual storytelling campaign drove the list of participants interested in enrolling in a related clinical trial at the healthcare network to over 200 people to date! The Multimedia Newsroom hosting the video and other supporting creative elements received almost 1,000 page views from journalists, and 48 news outlets – resulting in 286 downloads of brand-produced content. The video campaign reached a total audience of 524 million with 1,104 placements.
In addition to exclusives with CBS Mornings and TIME, other top-tier media coverage included CBS News Live on the CBS News Streaming Network, CBS News Online, Popular Science, Inside Edition Online, PEOPLE and Inside Edition’s YouTube.
Additional media coverage included Engadget, UNILAD, The Independent UK, IFL Science, Bloomberg Radio, WINS-AM (New York, NY), WABC-TV (New York, NY), WNBC-TV (New York, NY), 60+ syndicated airings via CBS News Radio, 300+ syndicated airings via multiple TV feeds.
The video published on the healthcare network’s YouTube channel has 31,000 views. The video shared on the company-owned LinkedIn received over 7K views, while the Instagram Reel video drove over 23K views.