Ghent University Hospital - "Case study Data"

FamousGrey

FamousGrey Groot-Bijgaarden, Belgium

1442

This ad is part of the ACT Responsible Collection

Brand: Ghent University Hospital
Country: Belgium

Advertiser: Ghent University Hospital

Title	Case study Data
Agency	FamousGrey
Campaign	Shortest Lives
Advertiser	Ghent University Hospital
Brand	Ghent University Hospital
Date of First Broadcast/Publication	2023 / 1
Business Sector	Institutional/Public Interest/Non-Profit Org.
Story	When you first hear you are expecting a baby it’s hard to already imagine this new life. The moment you truly become a parent is when you hear your baby’s heartbeat for the first time. This moment is when you connect emotionally and become a parent. In Belgium these heartbeats are data registered on ultrasound pictures and logged in the database of the hospital, only stored for medical reasons. When a baby is stillborn, parents never hear the heartbeat of their baby again. They have no memory left of when their baby was alive.
Philosophy	According to the grief counselors of Child and Family, a governmental agency for child wellbeing, parents can be helped in their grieving process by recognizing the existence of their baby. How? By holding onto details like weight, length, ultrasound pictures or anything that else they can remember their baby by. But unfortunately, during pregnancy there isn’t much to hold onto.
Problem	In Belgium 4,3%* of births are stillbirths. Losing your child is the worst thing a parent can imagine. But for parents of stillborn babies the grief is complicated as they have very little of their children to remember them by. They also feel they can’t always talk about it with their surroundings, as other people may find it hard to imagine the connection parents already had with their unborn child.
Result	Shortest Lives is a serene audio-visual reproduction of a stillborn baby’s heartbeat. It gives proof that your stillborn baby actually existed and offers a new and personalized way of grieving. It was initiated by the University hospital of Ghent, with the help of ‘Berrefonds’, a foundation that helps parents of stillborn babies receive the recognition and support they deserve. On the Shortest Lives’ website, you can request to receive your audiovisual experience of your baby’s heartbeat. Besides the heart rhythm, we also used other specific and personal data points like the baby’s gender, its size and the days of pregnancy to transform it into an audiovisual image of your baby’s heartbeat. Every part of the design was chosen to recognize and honor a stillborn baby’s life. The website was launched on 27th of January 2023 and promoted nationwide through PR by spreading a video of the stories of the parents of stillborn babies and their reaction to the audiovisual experience of their babies’ first heartbeats. - Shortest Lives had 4,99M earned impressions within the first week of the initiative. - Immediately after the launch there have been 223 requests by parents of stillborn babies to receive a personalized heartbeat of their baby. - Of all the parents who already received the heartbeat of their stillborn baby, 3 out of 4 shared it with friends and familie, thus creating more awareness for the subject and helping to break the taboo. - 86% of the parents who already received the heartbeat of their stillborn baby, said it helped them in their mourning process. - Today, 1 in 3 of the parents whose baby was stillborn in 2022, already filed a request to receive their baby’s heartbeat. - Other hospitals have reached out to offer this service to their patients as well.
Media Type	Case Study
Length	127 seconds
Creative Director	Peter Ampe
Creative Director	Laurie Lacourt
Creative Team	An-Sofie Keulen
Creative Team	Steve Maes
Account Director	Jef Leysen
Account Executive	Silke Galle
Strategic Planner	Yarne De Schrijver
Creative planner	Kirsten Vanderbeke
MOTION DESIGN	Sacha Lempereur
Developer	Arno Vanbiesen
RTV Producer	Myriam Maes
Director of Photography (DOP)	Gilles Desplanque
Offline Editor	Sven Vanhee
Post-production	FamousGrey Productions
Editor	Sven Vanhee
Editor	Gilles Desplanque
PR Agency	FamousRelations
PR contact	Astrid Jacobs
PR contact	Zoë Cnaepkens
PR contact	Eva Van Riet
Design	Uncle Grey
Designer	Christian Rahn
Designer	Charlotte Porsager
Designer	Lars Samuelsen