The ways of operating for the pharmaceutical industry aka “pharma” have continued to evolve post-COVID. COVID-necessitated acceleration of digital technology and literacy, big data, and change in the next wave of therapies coming through for patients, including cellular therapies, as well as an overall increase in complex and biomarker driven personalised medicine, meaning pharma needs to adapt to meet the new needs of all relevant stakeholders. Increased use of Telehealth and Teletrials, on-demand educational content, and digital education and promotion, are just some of the recent innovations which have seen an increase in this era to better meet Healthcare Practitioner (HCP) and patient needs. As Charles Darwin would say, “in order to survive and thrive in our new environment we need to ensure we are changing with it and try to keep pace.” Or even better, anticipate the change and stay one step ahead of it!
How Can Medical Affairs Thrive in This New Era?
1. Patient Engagement is Key
Ensure you’re working in close collaboration with the Patient Advocacy Groups (PAGs) who represents the Therapeutic Areas (TAs) your company is invested in – both pipeline and currently marketed products. HCPs are no longer the gatekeeper for patients to understand the different treatment options available, the evolving treatment landscape, including current trials, and the risks and benefits of various options available treatment options. HCPs also rarely dictate any one option for a patient, but rather serve to present the patient with all possible available options at the time, the risks and benefits of each, perhaps with a slight recommendation towards a particular option based on their own knowledge and the patients’ situations. It is then up to the patient to make an informed choice, according to their own unique circumstances and what they are hoping to achieve. More and more patients are driving their own treatment choices.
Without working closely with the PAGs, you have no way of knowing what patients currently want and need, both in terms of improving treatments in the TA, but also in terms of education to optimise both patient experience on a particular treatment, as well as better understanding what drives and differentiates treatment choices in the TA from a patient perspective. For example, understanding any challenges patients have adhering to a particular treatment regime so that your medical affairs team can work out ways of optimising the management of any treatment related adverse events to minimise any impact on the patients’ quality of life, which could lead to premature discontinuation or non-compliance and hence impact outcomes or decisions to use a particular therapy.
Increased use of Telehealth and Teletrials, on-demand educational content, and digital education & promotion, are just some of the recent innovations which have seen an increase in this era to better meet HCP & patient needs
Patients also play an increasing role in payer decisions to fund new therapies, and we are seeing an increasing number of patient-reported outcomes (PROs) being shown at scientific congresses for all new therapies. In addition to PRO’s, as Health Technology Assessment (HTA) evolves, we need to find better ways to include societal and personal impacts from innovative medicine which is not currently being assessed in the HTA process.
2. Invest Early in Medical Affairs
Start your medical affairs team early in the pre-launch/planning phase. You need medical affairs who are the functional team within pharma, with the most in-depth scientific knowledge and who are in the unique position based off both this, and industry code restrictions, to be able to interact with both PAGs and Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) in the pre-registration phase. Medical affairs can also be directly involved in the relevant registration clinical trials if your company is also the sponsor of these, as well as collaborative and investigator sponsored studies. Working in the research and development of the treatment to maximise the benefit to patients and subsequently the indications and potential of a given therapy in the market, as well as helping to generate the relevant data you will need to support the optimal use of your product once it becomes available in the market. Medical affairs can then support and drive the development of your whole registration, patient, and HCP education strategy, in addition to the commercial and marketing strategy based off this unique intelligence of the TA landscape, patient insight/need, KOL opinion, and trial experience. A successful launch then comes down to execution, followed by monitoring and adapting post-launch with the cross-functional team to ensure continued success in the TA.
3. Cut Through the Digital Noise
Create on-demand digital content and drive traffic to it. Wherever your target patient and HCPs population is, you must also be there. In other words, meet them where they are. Typical platforms which should be considered are; a company and/or therapy area website (for medical affairs, you can consider a product specific website to on-label and promotional product specific information too), a company - LinkedIn page, Twitter account, Instagram account, and even TikTok, if you want to engage a younger HCP and patient population (current demographic of TikTok users is 57% female with the majority of users (23.8%) falling in the 18-24 yr age bracket and under 35 yrs overall (DataReportal, January 2022)). All the content you previously developed for print form can be transferred to these channels in digital form. You can now also make your previously static print content much more interactive and palatable, for example, via the use of videos, and decreasing the volume of information in each post, but increasing the frequency of information output. This can increase the absorption of the content by your audience, and also make them more likely to want to engage with your content, as it is now being delivered to them in a more palatable and convenient format, which they can view on a device anywhere, at any time. The more positive the experience for your end user – HCP or patient – the more likely they will want to continue to engage and rely on your page for the disease area and/or product information they require. As a result of this increased reliance and interaction with your page(s), they we also become more familiar with your company and portfolio.
