As a rheumatologist or rheumatology health professional, you have a variety of ways in which you can work with local media. Receiving coverage in local news publications is an effective way to increase awareness of rheumatic diseases and spread the word about legislation that affects our discipline and the important work rheumatology professionals do.
This article outlines some basic tips to get you started. When you’re ready to start conducting media outreach, the ACR has additional resources to help you. The ACR’s Simple Tasks Member Toolkit is a Web-based resource that includes editorial-opinion and letter-to-the-editor templates that members are encouraged to use.
Build Relationships with Reporters/Editors in Your Area
A great way to get media coverage is to develop relationships with individual reporters. Reporters need to generate new stories every day and usually have little time to gather facts. If they see you as a trusted resource on early learning in your community, someone they can turn to for reliable information when they need it, they will be more responsive to you when you’d like them to cover an event or write an editorial.
Be a Resource; Provide the Local Angle
Media outlets focus on how current national news affects their readers/viewers locally. You can share with them state statistics and local stories about rheumatology that can help make a national story worth their time.
Be sure to provide reliable information, and be prepared to provide at least one person/source they can contact for additional comments or interviews. Reporters are more likely to cover your story, and possibly contact you for related stories, once they know you are a responsive and helpful resource to get them the information they need.
Got an Opinion? Write an Op-Ed
Op-eds are essays written by someone in the community to state their position on an issue. They are published in the editorial section of a news publication. Unlike editorials, which reflect a position of the paper’s editor or owner group, these pieces reflect the position of a reader, but are usually longer than a letter to the editor and have a more prominent position in the paper. The most coveted days to have an op-ed run are on the weekends. Legislators and other community leaders often read op-eds.
Major papers run several op-eds at a time, and other papers run only one. Some smaller papers almost never run op-eds (although smaller papers tend to allow longer letters to the editor).
Tips for writing and submitting an op-ed:
- Find out the word count and submission guidelines for your paper. The usual word count is approximately 500 words. Many newspapers list the word count and submission guidelines for their papers online in the editorial section. If they don’t, contact the editorial page editor. Some papers ask for photos and/or one-sentence descriptions of the author, so check before you submit.
- An op-ed needs to express an opinion. Provide local data to support your position. The more you can relate the issue to your community, the better.
- An op-ed is also a good opportunity for a call to action. If your piece addresses the importance of helping patients access specialty therapies, you can end your piece by asking local representatives to the U.S. House of Representatives to show their support for H.R. 1600 and senators to introduce the Patients’ Access to Treatments Act of 2015.
- Once you’ve submitted the op-ed, call the editor to make sure it was received. Even if you get confirmation, your piece can sometimes still get lost, so if it doesn’t get published for a couple of weeks after confirmation that they will publish, you can contact them again to check on the publication status.
Want to Respond to Another Opinion? Write a Letter
If there’s an article that you don’t agree with or you do agree with and want to reinforce the message, writing a letter to the editor is a great way to get your message to the community. Letters are usually shorter and easier to get published than op-eds, and once you’ve had one published, you can share it with legislators and business and community leaders.
You can also write letters to the editor about an important time-sensitive issue, even if there isn’t a published article to reference. For example, you can write a letter reflecting on the importance of early diagnosis for patients with rheumatic diseases during Arthritis Awareness Month in May or why rheumatology issues need to be a priority in the state budget during June, the peak month for budget negotiations.
Tips for writing and submitting a letter to the editor:
- Check the submission guidelines for your paper. Most papers have guidelines on their websites for submitting a letter, including the word count and contact information you must provide. Most letters are between 250 and 300 words and require the author’s address and phone number for verification. Stick to the word count! If your letter goes over their word count, they may edit it for space and inadvertently change the message of your letter.
- In most cases, your letter should be responding to an article, editorial or other letter published in the paper, but you can also write a letter related to a current event. Mention the title and date of the original piece in your letter. Try to respond within a few days of the publication date of the original article or editorial.
- Give your letter local appeal by including data or new information relevant to the local community.
- Newspapers usually have a limit to how frequently you can submit a letter or have a letter published (usually one letter a month), so if you want to submit several letters in a row, keep this in mind.
- Most papers will call you to verify your information before publishing your letter, so if you are going to be out of the office, give them your cell phone number or check your messages frequently so you don’t miss this opportunity to get published.
- Even if your letter isn’t published, it’s still a good exercise in forming your arguments for quality early learning and a way to educate the editorial staff of the paper.
- Don’t forget the weekly papers. People read local and weekly papers, so this is another good avenue for delivering your message.
For additional support in your media outreach efforts, contact ACR Director of Public Relations Bonny Senkbeil via e-mail at [email protected].
