Grand Rounds February 2, 2024: Strategies for Improving Public Understanding of FDA and the Products It Regulates…Why Should We Care, and What Might We Do? (Susan C. Winckler, RPh, Esq)

Posted on by Elizabeth Mccamic

Speaker

Susan C. Winckler, RPh, Esq
Chief Executive Officer
Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA

Keywords

U.S. Food and Drug Administration, FDA, Misinformation, Communication, Health Information

Key Points

  • U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Robert Califf asked the Reagan-Udall Foundation to conduct research and consult with experts to better understand how consumers find, consume, and perceive health information, especially regarding FDA-regulated products.
  • From January to September 2023, the Foundation conducted in-depth research and held 5 listening sessions to learn how people consume and understand health information. They held roundtable conversations with experts to understand their thoughts on what the FDA might do to better communicate, and they conducted polls and held 25 individual interviews. The research yielded a report that provides 5 observations, 16 potential strategies, and more than 40 potential tactics for the FDA to consider.
  • This work is important because the digital health information environment and limited public trust in government institutions represent pressing challenges for FDA. The spread of misinformation has accelerated, in part because more people than ever are accessing health information on the internet and via social media. The growing problem of misinformation undermines confidence in science and public health institutions, and the misuse of products can cause harm and confusion.
  • The primary finding is that clear consistent communication both to consumers directly and via medical channels is critical to the FDA’s mission to protect and promote public health. Consumers trust policy – and the scientific evidence on which it is based – if communicated to them properly. Sound science, sound policy, and sound communication are each fundamental to the Agency’s success.
  • Observation 1: There is a lack of understanding, particularly among consumers, about the FDA’s mission, responsibilities, and authority. Potential strategies: Increase direct-to-consumer education, emphasizing the scientific rigor behind, and the reasons for, FDA’s regulatory processes; collect, analyze, and use information about consumer use of FDA’s website; increase interaction with the media.
  • Observation 2: Information vacuums breed misunderstanding. Potential strategies: “Prebunk” health misinformation; collaborate with other organizations (within and beyond government); monitor and respond to misunderstandings.
  • Observation 3: Communication clarity, and consistency, matters. Potential strategies: Adopt a consistent, fact-based tone; use concise, digestible, plain-language approaches; use storytelling and personal narratives.
  • Observation 4: Healthcare professionals are trusted messengers, but they need information. Potential strategy: Increase regular communication with health care professionals.
  • Observation 5: Consistent, multi-channel messages resonate with consumers. Potential strategies: Collaborate with many partners (across and outside government); leverage communications expertise across FDA; communicate creatively; align multi-channel source material before announcements.
  • The FDA has an opportunity to take a more proactive approach to anticipating, listening for, spotting and defusing health misconceptions before they escalate. The FDA can leverage more communications channels, messengers, and mediums to reach the public. To build trust, the FDA must approach communications with an emphasis on clarity and humility.

 

Discussion Themes

-How can the FDA communicate the fact that the best advice tomorrow may be different from the best advice today? How do people want to hear that science is a moving target? In all of our conversations, someone would say, in an effort to be confident, we did that wrong in the pandemic. Some tactics are routinely saying this is based on our best understanding of the information we have today, to convey that our understanding of science changes.

–Were you able to examine responses from groups that can be particularly challenging such as vaccine deniers and climate change skeptics? Will the strategies pierce the veil of misinformation with these groups? The government is not the communicator to reach these group, so we asked if there are opportunities for trusted groups or messengers to reach these audiences.

–Did you consider examples of organizations in government and the private sector that may do a particularly good job of this? A current project at the Foundation is how can we take FDA information and power places where consumers look for information, similar to how a Weather app is powered by government information from NOAA.

 

Tags

#pctGR, @Collaboratory1