Challenge
Osteoporosis can affect postmenopausal women as young as 50. Referred to as a “silent disease,” many women go undiagnosed and untreated because there typically are no symptoms before experiencing a fracture. Even then, osteoporosis may not be diagnosed. Research suggests only two in 10 older women in the U.S. who suffer from a fracture are tested or treated for osteoporosis. More than 1,000 postmenopausal women were surveyed by Radius Health, HealthyWomen and the National Osteoporosis Foundation, and many women believed they could treat osteoporosis by taking calcium alone; others believe the disease wouldn’t affect them until their 70s or 80s. Yet more women over the age of 55 are hospitalized every year in the U.S. due to an osteoporosis-related fracture than heart attacks, strokes or breast cancer. To make matters worse, no single physician specialty “owns” osteoporosis, so navigating how to get proper attention for treatment can be challenging.
Solution
W2O’s analytics and market research confirmed many postmenopausal women aren’t proactive about their bone health, aren’t realizing their potential osteoporosis risk, and aren’t linking fractures and osteoporosis until it’s too late. Research shows Baby Boomer women share content on Facebook, so we created the Facebook Fractured Truth Facebook Community to: Elevate osteoporosis and fracture risk as a critical health issue among postmenopausal women Enhance the osteoporosis fracture conversations Educate women over the age of 50 about the critical need to be proactive about their bone health and recognize the connection between fracture and osteoporosis Encourage women to discuss treatment options with their healthcare professional Via GIFs, video, custom graphics, and supportive web content, the Fractured Truth Facebook page not only provides information and resources about osteoporosis, but encourages women to talk to their doctor about fracture risk and osteoporosis. To further encourage conversation and engagement, the Fractured Truth community hosted a Facebook Live event around World Osteoporosis Day with an impressive group of panelists.
Results
The Fractured Truth Facebook community reached more than 2.6m unique users in just over a year. In fact, Fractured Truth had a higher growth rate (82.3%) than the average osteoporosis Facebook page (24.6%) and the average unbranded pharma Facebook page (13.0%). 11.8m impressions secured from April 2017 launch through May 2018 158k reactions, 24k shares, 391k clicks 15k page likes in its first year, garnering an even larger community than other Facebook pages of key osteoporosis advocacy organizations, which have been established pages in this space for far longer than ours Facebook Live garnered more than 2,700 organic video views and reached more than 13,000 Facebook users with no paid support The page also garnered higher than average patient engagement, both when compared to other osteoporosis pages and unbranded pharma pages.
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