Health problems are a serious matter, but for people living with such conditions, humor can make difficult conversations easier to endure.

For advertisers, finding that humor without trivializing someone's experience is a much harder assignment.

At a panel during Advertising Week New York, executives and comedians discussed how brands can use humor when the subject is sensitive and the consequences of getting it wrong are significant.

The audience, not the creative team, should determine whether a joke belongs in an ad, the panel argued. And in healthcare, where consumer trust is already difficult to earn, the wrong tone can do more damage than a forgettable campaign.

Remember, the audience decides what’s actually funny

The biotechnology and pharmaceutical company Genentech arrived at humor as a strategy after years of trying a more conventional advertising approach.

Genentech spent two years running ads that educated people with diabetes about the risk of vision loss. But despite the repeated awareness messaging, patients still weren’t consistently taking the next step to get screened. The problem became personal for Erin Echter, enterprise lead for patient and caregiver marketing at Genentech, when she discovered that her mother had concealed her diabetes diagnosis for six years. By the time her family learned about it, her mother was experiencing vision loss. “This isn’t an information problem. This is probably an emotional barrier,” said Echter.

Rather than push for even more educational advertising, Genentech spent six to eight months listening to people in the diabetes community, including poring through conversations on Reddit, “where the anonymous conversations were happening.”

The company found patients discussing shame, stigma, and the overwhelming responsibilities of managing their condition. It also found jokes and memes that helped people cope.

Those conversations informed Genentech's partnership with comedian Damon Wayans, who lives with diabetes, for its "All Eyes on DME" campaign about diabetic macular edema.

Genentech chose humor after observing how patients were already communicating with one another.

That understanding is particularly valuable in an industry where advertisers have struggled to earn consumer trust. Among US consumers who had seen a healthcare ad in the prior year, just 23% trusted ads appearing on search engines or in doctors' offices and hospitals, the highest-ranked settings in EMARKETER's January 2026 US Digital Health survey.

Make the situation funny, not the person

Humor already has a place in healthcare conversations, particularly on social media.

Humorous and relatable content accounted for 34% of NurseTok videos but generated 49% of engagement, according to an NPHub analysis of 5,217 videos covered by EMARKETER. Patient care content accounted for 33% of videos but generated just 26% of engagement.

Still, strong engagement doesn’t mean that every subject is fair game.

For Echter, “the patient is never the punchline.”

Genentech applied that principle when patient ambassadors repeatedly stumbled over a medication's name during a video shoot. Rather than discard the footage, the company turned those moments into a humorous montage acknowledging how difficult pharmaceutical names can be to pronounce.

Echter said the resulting creative became one of the company's top-performing ads.

The humor came from an awkward experience patients could recognize, not from mocking the patients themselves.

Another common problem: Marketers sometimes mistake their own preferences for those of their audiences, according to David Rosenberg, co-founder and chief comedy officer at Crowdwork Creative.

"I think they believe that they're the audience," he said when asked about brands' biggest mistakes in using comedy.

For marketers, knowing where the joke lands requires listening to people whose experiences may be very different from their own.

Permission takes more than one campaign

Genentech didn’t introduce comedic jabs overnight. Instead, the company spent years incorporating lighter moments into its advertising before launching its partnership with Wayans.

The preparation becomes more important as healthcare advertising expands across digital channels.

US healthcare and pharma connected TV (CTV) ad spending will grow 23.7% YoY to $4.69 billion in 2026 and surpass linear TV spending by 2028, per EMARKETER's forecast.

For marketers, the work begins with understanding how audiences discuss sensitive subjects, involving people with relevant experiences in creative development, and testing whether humor improves engagement without undermining trust.

Genentech's campaign illustrates that process, although the panel didn't establish whether its partnership with Wayans increased eye-screening rates.

Before brands ask whether a subject can be funny, they need to understand who's laughing, what they're laughing about, and whether they've earned a place in the conversation. A joke that earns a laugh may open a conversation. Whether it encourages consumers to act is another question.

This was originally featured in the EMARKETER Daily newsletter. For more marketing insights, statistics, and trends, subscribe here.