• by Erik Sass , September 29, 2008

NBC's Digital Health Network is expanding its distribution with six new partnerships, including four online and two out-of-home platforms, as well as the launch of a new online video portal. The announcement comes as big video content producers, especially the TV nets, seek greater exposure via the Web and place-based digital networks.

The new online distribution partners include the American Cancer Society Web site; EBSCO Publishing, a database aggregator serving libraries with a portfolio of over 200 research databases; redOrbit, a site carrying news for science and technology enthusiasts; and Wellsphere, a popular consumer health Web site that connects patients to resources dealing with their particular conditions.

The new out-of-home partners are StayHealthy, which delivers health-related content to kiosks in college campuses and gyms, and Windstone Communications, which operates MD Outernet, a network of digital video displays in medical waiting rooms that carries health and lifestyle programming.

These new partnerships augment NBC's existing stable of Web and wireless distribution deals, which provide content to online publishers and marketers like Healthline Networks, RightHealth, Wellness Wireless and Family Marketing.

NBC also has a partnership with NCC Spot Cable, which is launching a video-on-demand health channel called MyLife.

In the out-of-home arena, NBC Health has a deal with eTagz, a company with a patent for a technique that uses RFID chips in product packaging to target in-store signage according to consumer purchase decisions. NBC also recently announced a content-sharing ad partnership with the Patient Channel and the Newborn Channel, national networks based in hospitals.

Both networks were developed as joint ventures by NBCU and its parent company GE, as part of GE Healthcare. The Patient Channel is available 24/7 on TVs in patient rooms and waiting areas in over 1,600 hospitals. It claims to reach over 6 million patients a year with its roster of over 40 educational programs on various topics, such as asthma, diabetes, cholesterol and osteoporosis.

Meanwhile, the Newborn Channel reaches neonatal waiting areas and recovery rooms in over 1,000 hospitals nationwide. It claims to reach 2.5 million new mothers every year, with content covering issues like infant care, maternal care, breastfeeding and immunizations.

NBC isn't the only one making deals with out-of-home health networks. CBS provides video content to Healium, which operates digital monitors in doctors' offices around the country and hopes to install displays in 120,000 medical practices by the end of 2008, delivering 3 million viewers per month.