We partner with patients and screening participants to share their real stories. We want to encourage more people to take part in screening, so we can save lives.
In 2024, Mary Kennedy joined our Patient and Public Partnership. Mary’s story shows the importance of bowel screening - even when you feel well and have no symptoms of bowel cancer.
Mary’s bowel cancer was found when she took part in our BowelScreen programme. She says: “I want to shout about BowelScreen from the rooftops! To hear that I had cancer was a real shock to me; it was a lot to take in. I had absolutely no symptoms. I was walking and swimming as usual. I was enjoying life and my retirement.”
How we worked together
We co-designed a social media campaign with Mary, which ran during 2024.
This included:
- sharing video and static image ads to share Mary’s story, in her own words
- using these ads to build awareness about bowel screening
- re-targeting these ads to people who had already engaged with similar content
- using these ads to drive people to the BowelScreen registration web page.
What we achieved
Mary’s story struck a chord with people. People engaged with the campaign. They commented positively on Mary’s story and shared their own experiences.
Compared with similar social media campaigns, Mary’s content performed above average.
Some of the results showed:
- over 131,000 video views in one video ad that had a high click-through rate to our website
- over 138,000 video views in another video ad that helped us reach and re-target 325,000 people
- over 8,400 clicks to the BowelScreen website from just one ad
- over 5,000 clicks in one traffic ad that featured high engagement from women.
There was a 15% increase in visits to our website in 2024 compared with 2023. This successful social media campaign contributed to this increase.
Why patient stories matter
This campaign showed us that:
- real, human stories connect and motivate people better than standard ads
- working in partnership with patients helps to build trust and credibility
- storytelling can help normalise screening. It encourages more people to take action and take part in our bowel screening programme.
Next steps
We will continue to:
- use patient stories in our social media campaigns for all our screening programmes
- work with our Patient and Public Partnership representatives to co-design information resources.
This will help more people to take part in screening.
This campaign highlights the power of co-designing with people to share human stories. It shows how it can improve our public health messaging. By working together - patients, public and staff - we can encourage more people to choose screening and save more lives.
- We presented the results of this co-designed social media campaign at the 2025 HSE Patient and Public Partnership conference.
- Mary’s story is included in the Breakthrough Cancer Research ‘Cancer Revolution’ exhibition. The exhibition runs until 31 October 2025 at Stephen’s Green shopping centre in Dublin. Find out more and book your free tickets.
- Watch Mary’s video.