Rather than revisit the traditional communications path of a patient education campaign, we decided to focus on the carer – the cornerstone of daily support for a person living with schizophrenia – by addressing the unmet educational and emotional needs of this over-worked, under-appreciated community.

We set up ‘The Carer Academy', a flexible educational initiative for carers of people living with schizophrenia. The initiative would offer them free skills-based training in an easy-to-access format, while also addressing their emotional needs to help ease their sense of isolation, worry and stress.

Offering carers the emotional support, practical tools and key skills they need on a daily basis would empower them to create a stronger, more supportive and nurturing environment for the people they care for. For the brand, it would be an opportunity to reach and engage a new influential audience by offering a service the community really needs.

Having conducted research among our target audience, we were then ready to drive awareness and course sign-up in Europe, Australia and Canada, to achieve our first year target of 200 participants. In preparation for the launch date of 12 October 2015 we targeted both health professionals and patient advocacy groups.

Targeting health professionals

We presented our research findings at ENCP Amsterdam, Europe’s largest neuroscience congress, addressing psychiatrists, neurologists and psychologists who treat disorders of the brain. Our aim was to engage mental health professionals in a discussion on the importance of the care-giver’s role, show them why the course was needed, and encourage them to recommend it to carers.

Targeting patient groups

We also presented the results at a dedicated EUFAMI patient advocacy Symposium, announcing that registration was open. We then worked with the global network’s 60 prominent patient advocacy groups to inform carers and encourage sign-up.

The 2015 course attracted nearly 17,000 participants, exceeding our target by 8500%. By launch, we’d already received 1,433 comments on our forum:

“Really looking forward to this course because I think it will be helpful. My son is suffering with psychosis, auditory hallucinations and hallucinations. He's only 19 years old and I find the whole illness very disturbing and traumatic. Here's hoping knowledge will ease my anxieties” (Carer comment posted before the course).

Participant feedback consistently showed how we touched people’s lives and helped make a tangible difference.

• 94% of course participants engaged with the course programme in their home taking advantage of our mobile-friendly format.

• 61% visited the site a few times each week.

• 40% participated in the forums, generating 27,103 comments at the end of the two weeks.

• 97.5% felt the course met or exceeded their expectations, and 1,290 have registered for the 2016 course.

Caring for Carers created an emotional connection between a pharmaceutical company and multiple audiences (healthcare providers, mental health advocates, people living with the illness and their loved ones) through a public relations campaign that truly impacted their lives.

The PR elements of the campaign included a survey of carers, which we brought to the attention of our audiences through several tactics such as events and media relations; an online course, which we wrote based on the survey data and then launched at a mental health symposium and to relevant media; and a social media community.

Carers come from all sections of society, crossing boundaries of social demographics, geography, age and gender. Our first challenge was to find our audience and learn more about their specific needs and concerns, which would then influence and help direct the course content.

We worked with patient support groups to carry out a survey of 1,000 carers in 25 countries, identifying their most significant emotional burdens and frequently asked questions. We found that 1 in 3 carers feel they are close to ‘breaking point’, while 93% would like more support.

We then worked with King’s College London, the EUFAMI network (European Federation of Associations of Families of People with Mental Illness) and Open University’s Mass Open Online Course (MOOC) platform, FutureLearn, to develop ‘Caring for People with Psychosis and Schizophrenia’, a 2-week accredited course that carers can work through at their own pace.

More than 26 million people worldwide live with schizophrenia. Many have dedicated, but non-professional carers who are family members. For these people – and their carers – quality of life can be a real issue.

Otsuka Lundbeck, developers of a new once-a-month schizophrenia drug, Abilify Maintena, gave us a brief for a Public Affairs programme to educate and demonstrate how their solution makes a difference.

Our key insight was that, in this field of mental health, where the challenges of daily living and social interaction can be immense, the support of the carer is critical to the wellbeing of the person living with schizophrenia.

Yet informal carers receive very little professional support, training or resources of any kind. They’re expected to learn on the job, often working under extreme pressure and dealing single-handedly with challenges they’re not qualified to deal with. This insight launched us on a new creative route…