Tips voor Scripts

The Center for Media & Health (CMH), located in The Netherlands, created an online service platform called Tips voor Scripts (TvS, or Tips for Scripts). On this TvS platform, social change organisations provide content information (tip sheets) to inspire scriptwriters and producers of Dutch drama and soap series. A tip sheet contains data about a specific medical or lifestyle issue (such as dementia, infectious diseases, sport and exercise, hearing loss and diabetes prevention, drug use, etc.) Formative research conducted by the CMH showed that scriptwriters of Dutch soap and drama series are positive about collaborating with health communication professionals, as long as they maintain their creative freedom. They welcome accurate and reliable information on various issues that can help them create their characters and storylines in a timely manner.

The project is based on the knowledge that media professionals and health communication professionals have their own professional cultures. Thus, the challenge is to create a common "language" or a mutual framework that both professional fields can understand and relate to. Through the TvS platform, these professionals can exchange ideas and information with the goal of enhancing collaborative practice. TvS aims to:

• Invest in media as a primary setting for social change communication.
• Give insights into how social change organisations (e.g., health organisations) and the media world (specifically, scriptwriters and producers from soap and drama series) think and act with respect to healthy lifestyle topics.
• Create a mutual framework and a concrete instrument (database) for a more comprehensive collaboration with scriptwriters.

The platform has been developed by CMH in collaboration with partner organisations such as the Dutch Institute for Sports and Exercise, the Foundation for Sexually Transmitted Diseases, Trimbos Institute, and scriptwriters and producers from Scriptstudio/Endemol Netherlands.