School of Public Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
Med J Aust. 2009;191(11-12):620-4. doi: 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2009.tb03354.x.
To describe the content and structure of health and medical news and current affairs reportage on free-to-air television in Sydney, New South Wales.
Review of content of all health-related evening news and current affairs items recorded over 47 months (May 2005-March 2009).
Number and length of health-related items on news and current affairs programs, and topics covered in these (21 broad content areas and the leading 50/237 specific content areas); use of news actors, soundbite duration and apparent news triggers.
11,393 news items and 2309 current affairs items were analysed. Health news items lasted a median of 97 seconds. In a randomly selected sample of 251 items, items featured a mean of 2.2 news actors (3.9 in longer current affairs items). Median soundbite duration was 7.2 seconds for news items and 8.9 seconds for current affairs items. People affected by disease or injury were the most commonly featured news actors (84% of items), followed by experts and health professionals (56%). Many items (42%) appeared to be triggered by incidents, but a further 42% could have been triggered by press releases and other forms of publicity.
Health workers wishing to participate in news coverage should be aware that complex issues are reduced to fit the time constraints and presentational formulae of the news media. Advocates should plan their communication strategies to accommodate these constraints.
描述新南威尔士州悉尼市免费电视上的健康和医学新闻及时事报道的内容和结构。
对所有健康相关晚间新闻和时事项目的内容进行 47 个月（2005 年 5 月至 2009 年 3 月）的记录回顾。
新闻和时事节目中健康相关项目的数量和长度，以及这些项目涵盖的主题（21 个广泛的内容领域和前 50/237 个具体内容领域）；新闻演员的使用、旁白时长和明显的新闻触发因素。
分析了 11393 条新闻和 2309 条时事。健康新闻项目的时长中位数为 97 秒。在随机抽取的 251 个项目样本中，每个项目平均有 2.2 个新闻演员（更长的时事项目中为 3.9 个）。新闻项目的旁白时长中位数为 7.2 秒，时事项目为 8.9 秒。受疾病或伤害影响的人是最常出现的新闻演员（84%的项目），其次是专家和卫生专业人员（56%）。许多项目（42%）似乎是由事件触发的，但另有 42%的项目可能是由新闻稿和其他形式的宣传触发的。
希望参与新闻报道的卫生工作者应该意识到，复杂的问题被简化以适应新闻媒体的时间限制和表现形式。宣传者应该规划他们的沟通策略，以适应这些限制。
