RLS-UK Media coverage: Not So Good News

[Daragh]

Morning All,

On 8th April I wrote to Healthy Magazine, which you may be familiar with as it's the Holland & Barrett magazine. I explained who I was and that RLS-UK were trying to secure a piece in the magazine on RLS. I offered to assist them if they wished to run an article on the condition.

Helathy Magazine responded on 18th April saying: "Thanks for yor email. We are, in fact, doing a feature on restless legs in our May/June issue. Please look out for it in your Holland & Barrett store. If you get in touch nearer the time we would be happy to send you a link."

On 18th April I responded to this, saying: "That is wonderful news! I would very much appreciate if you could afford us the chance of seeing your article before it goes to print. This would give us the opportunity to assist you in ensuring the article is accurate. We regularly encounter medical professionals who are staggeringly misinformed about RLS, who list it as a psychological condition, who call it Ekbom Syndrome, the list goes on. I will advise our 900 forum members to look out for the article. They tend to be particularly vocal about misrepresentations of RLS in the media and while I have no doubt that yours will be an excellent portrayal of the condition, I do hope you will allow us to work with you on it to ensure yours is the professional represenation we would expect from Holland & Barrett."

Healthy Magazine replied: Our article was written by an expert in his field and has been checked and verified. Thanks for the offer though.

On Saturday past I went to my local Holland & Barrett to get a copy of the magazine as I was looking forward to reading the RLS article. The promised article was not in the magazine. I then secured a copy of the March/April edition (thanks so much to Kaarina for all the work she put in helping me get this!) of Healthy Magazine and while there was an article on insomnia, there was no article on RLS.

So, I am left in a position where I do not know whether or not Healthy Magazine will be running an RLS article or whether they have confused RLS with insomnia. I have no name for the person with whom I was in contact as they simply signed their email 'Healthy'.

I wrote to Healthy Magazine on Monday but have had no response. I will keep you posted...

Daragh, Chair RLS-UK

[Hidden]

Definately not good news.....

[bambisoloved]

Dear RLSUK Chair

Very good letter but it sounds to me that they were not going to take the risk of putting the article in their magazine just in case they got it wrong and possible bad publicity despite your offer of help. I dont understand why they didnt accept your help. Perhaps if they are selling and advising people with RLS on what might help their condition your input might effect their sales ?

Caroline

[Gmc54]

Holland and Barrett seem to be less and less interested in their customers. Their prices have been going through the roof lately.

I will keep an eye out for this article as they may decide to publish it in future, but I wont hold my breath.

[dangermouse]

I found [url= healthy-magazine.co.uk/well...] this [/url] on the Healthy mag website.

[Kaarina Administrator in reply to dangermouse]

Yes it was dated October 2010.

[dangermouse]

Don't know what happened with my link above -but if you click on it , it loads. It was posted in Oct 2010!

[yatestobe]

I have the article in the addition ov holland & barrett on rls i didnt think it did justice to this syndrome we all experience at all .......just my opinion x

[Hidden]

Does not surprise me, I used to work for them, Some can be an arrogant lot at head office!

Cazx

[Daragh]

Further to the above I emailed Holland and Barrett, Healthy Magazine and Holland and Barrets's PR company and have no response from any of them, yet...