Frontline19

To spotlight the mental-health crisis gripping the NHS, Frontline19 partnered with adam&eveDDB to create the ‘Sicker than the Patients' campaign. The two-minute film, produced in the style of CCTV footage, captures the true heart-breaking emotions of NHS workers.

After more than a decade of underfunding, the National Health Service crisis is far from ‘new news’. While staff support already takes a back seat, long NHS waiting lists and scarce resources lead to further pressure as frontline workers bear the brunt of patients’ frustration and anger. Frontline19 is a UK nationwide service delivering supervision, debriefing and emotional support to healthcare workers during times of crisis. Our objective was to increase awareness of the mental health crisis among NHS staff and drive donations to Frontline19’s counselling services.

With Channel 4's well-known stable of ‘blue light' programming and remit of creating change through entertainment, this was a perfect opportunity for them to step in and support. They knew shows like ‘24 hours inA&E' deeply resonate with their viewers, so it felt right to amplify a campaign that also looks at frontline workers' experiences behind the scenes. To extend the reach of this film and bring it to an audience who already cared about frontline workers, Channel 4 shared airtime to place the ad around relevant shows. It aired in breaks of some of our most popular blue light programming such as ‘24hours in A&E’ and ‘999 on the Front Line’.

But Channel 4 wanted to ensure this ground-breaking initiative felt truly unignorable, so they went one step further to bring the true stories of NHS workers to life. Across three days during the launch of the campaign they replaced their usual continuity voiceovers with that of real NHS employees leading up to the Channel 4 programmes. In the moving voiceovers, the frontline workers share their lived experience of mental health struggles to encourage viewers of the blue light shows to consider the people behind the uniforms.