UW News

October 7, 2010

UW Medicine brand launch helps inform the public on health system

UW Medicine launched its new marketing and messaging campaign with a special event for its leadership team at Meany Hall on Sept. 27.


The campaign’s main goal is to increase the public’s awareness about the care UW Medicine health system provides at each entity — Harborview, UW Medical Center, Northwest Hospital, UW Neighborhood Clinics and Airlift Northwest.


“The mission of UW Medicine is to improve the health of the public, locally and globally,” says Dr. Paul Ramsey, chief executive officer, UW Medicine, and dean of the UW School of Medicine. “We provide a service unmatched by any other health-care system in the five-state region of Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho (WWAMI).”


During the past year, UW Medicine’s marketing and communications team worked closely with the brand and creative strategy firm DNA-Seattle to develop the branding and messaging strategy to help increase the public’s knowledge about health care. The brand development process included extensive market research, which revealed that consumers viewed all health-care providers as being somewhat similar.


“This key insight confirmed the need to design an effective method of communicating health information to the public so that they can understand the depth and breadth of UW Medicine, which is the only system that provides all levels of care from primary care through the most complex quarternary care,” says Johnese Spisso, chief health system officer, UW Medicine. “We want our community to understand that our world-class health system is available to them locally and that they can benefit from the clinical care, teaching and research that are improving health outcomes around the world.”


The new campaign will feature real-life stories of patients, physicians and staff that give meaning to the brand tagline: “From here, we change the world.” Each story will show how local medical advances have ripple effects that extend to the far reaches of the globe.


UW Medicine includes Harborview Medical Center, University of Washington Medical Center, Northwest Hospital & Medical Center, UW Neighborhood Clinics, UW School of Medicine, UW Physicians and Airlift Northwest.


Over the next several months, information about the UW Medicine health system, its benefits and how new patients can access its world-class health care will be shared in various venues including the open enrollment fairs scheduled for UW employees.


For more information, contact UW Medicine News, Community Relations and Marketing at 206.543.3620 or uwmmktg@uw.edu