Case Study: Turning NHS population health data into a human story that reached Forbes

Client

Graphnet Health and the Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Health and Care Partnership

The challenge

Population health management is one of the NHS's most important priorities, but it isn't always an easy subject to communicate.

Algorithms, dashboards and shared care records rarely capture attention outside specialist audiences. Yet behind the technology are real people whose lives can be transformed when health services identify need earlier and intervene before a crisis occurs.

Graphnet and the Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Health and Care Partnership wanted to showcase an innovative programme that was using population health tools to identify residents at greatest risk from fuel poverty and poor health. The challenge was to move beyond describing the technology and instead communicate why the work mattered.

Our approach

Rather than leading with the dashboard, we focused on the human consequences of fuel poverty.

The story wasn't about software. Not really. It was about people with severe respiratory disease having to choose between heating their homes and powering the oxygen equipment keeping them alive.

Working closely with NHS partners, we developed a feature that combined robust evidence, frontline clinical insight and powerful patient stories to demonstrate how population health data could drive practical action across health, housing, local government and the voluntary sector.

The communications highlighted how clinicians were identifying vulnerable patients before they reached crisis point, connecting them with financial support, home improvements and clinical interventions that could improve both their health and quality of life.

Real patient experiences formed the heart of the story. One resident described having to choose between heating his home and running his oxygen equipment before receiving support through the programme.

Another family, living with mould, unsafe housing and deteriorating health, received coordinated support that transformed both their home environment and their wellbeing while helping prevent further hospital admissions.

Alongside these stories, we incorporated measurable outcomes that demonstrated the scale of impact, including financial support delivered to residents, increased referrals into community services and evidence that patients were receiving more proactive care.

By balancing compelling human stories with credible NHS data, the programme became relevant not only to healthcare audiences but also to journalists covering inequality, public policy and the wider cost-of-living crisis.

Results

The story secured prominent coverage in Forbes, introducing the programme to an international audience through a feature examining the growing public health impact of poverty in England.

It was subsequently shared widely across national healthcare, health technology and regional media, reaching millions of readers, while NHS organisations and partners amplified the coverage through their own websites, newsletters and communications channels.

The campaign also helped position Graphnet and its NHS partners as leaders in demonstrating how population health management can address health inequalities through practical, evidence-based intervention.

Why it worked

This campaign succeeded because it focused on people rather than technology.

Instead of asking journalists to write about a population health dashboard, it showed how data could identify someone living in a cold home before they were admitted to hospital, how joined-up services could improve living conditions, and how relatively small interventions could make a profound difference to someone's health and independence.

The technology enabled the work, but it wasn't the story. The story was about preventing avoidable illness, reducing inequalities and helping vulnerable people live healthier lives.

That distinction transformed a complex digital health project into a piece of journalism with broad national appeal.

Key outcomes

• Secured feature coverage in Forbes through an established editorial relationship.

• Generated further coverage and sharing across healthcare, health technology and regional media.

• Amplified by NHS organisations and programme partners through websites, newsletters and social media.

• Demonstrated Graphnet's role within a major NHS population health initiative without producing a product-led story.

• Positioned the programme as an example of how data, collaboration and frontline care can work together to improve lives.

Communications insight

One of the biggest misconceptions in health technology PR is that journalists want to hear about the technology itself. In reality, they want to understand what changes because the technology exists.

When communications start with people's lives rather than product features, even highly technical healthcare programmes can become stories that resonate far beyond the NHS.