H1N1 Communications - The Impact of Personal Experience

This online article describes the difference that author Gerald Baron's personal experience with the illness H1N1 flu has made for him as a communications specialist already working in pandemic flu communications. According to Mr. Baron: "there are significant gaps in public information. One of the keys to effective crisis communication is anticipating the questions and having the answers readily available in ways that people want to get them. But I discovered a number of questions for which answers were not so readily available:

• How do I know it is H1N1 and not seasonal flu?
  
• How do I know when to call the doctor?
  
• How will the doctor know that it is H1N1?
  
• I know that people are dying from this but how do I tell how serious it is?
  
• If it is not much different than the regular or seasonal flu, why is there so much hype and concern about it?
  
• If I don't need to go to the doctor, what can I do at home to treat it?
  
• Why should we go to the doctor and sit in the waiting room infecting others when what they told us could have been told over the phone?
  
• Why are they insisting on social distancing except when it comes to going into the doctor's office?
  
• Why did the little kids get over it so quick and my wife have it for over a week?"
  

Mr. Baron observes that in an environment of fear, the "hunger for information becomes intense", and the "patience with anything other than what is sought and needed right now is very limited". He recommends studying the organisation of the Microsoft website called H1N1 Response Center. It uses a flu self-assessment in question and answer format to get the answer to the question: how do I know it is H1N1 and not seasonal flu? Mr. Baron counters physician criticism of using a website for disease diagnosis: "The web is one of the most important tools for people educating themselves and also helping themselves. Whether the profession likes it or not, it will be an increasingly important way for people to get access to much needed health information. This should be welcomed by the profession, not fought." Ultimately, he agreed with website advice to consult a physician if certain symptoms were present, but he emphasised the importance of the immediacy and clarity of having diagnostic information available on the internet as a first stop for information in a crisis.

He concludes with what he feels is the most important lesson in his experiential survey of information sources on the H1N1 virus: When personal experiences are available in crisis situations, "we can think through very carefully, use our imagination, and talk very intentionally and intently with those who are or who have been victims. In doing so we will prepare much more effectively."