For pharmaceutical companies, negative publicity is always a risk. The success of research, trials and the rollout of a product is dependent on the trust of the public, patient or participant. For this trust to be sustained, a positive image of the pharma industry needs to be maintained.
In a year characterised by a rapid response to a global pandemic, the industry enjoyed a sizable approval bounce. 56% of the British public have a more favourable impression of the pharmaceutical industry than they did at the beginning of the pandemic. Presenting scalable solutions to global problems provided most people with cause to change their opinion. To put it simply – pharma are the heroes, for now.
But how long is that set to last? Cyber-attacks and recent news regarding price increases may signal a change in public opinion. If pharma is going to capitalise on this approval bounce, there needs to be a collective shift from past behaviours. For many companies, med tech tools will be the root of sustained progress in the right direction.
Scalable solutions to global problems
The audience of the pharmaceutical industry is global. From Germany to Guinea, patients across the globe rely on medicine and treatment in the same way, but often the medical landscape is different from region to region.
The expansion boom in the mid 2010s that saw pharmaceutical companies explore multi-regional opportunities in emerging markets didn’t come to fruition as many had hoped. Multinationals encountered difficulties when setting up in emerging markets, with challenges in patient access, talent recruitment and communication.
The potential benefits of med tech to facilitate communication and enable a hotbed of innovative solutions is massive. Particularly, the capacity for virtual engagement to dissolve the language barrier and enable over-time communication.
When engaging stakeholders to expand market access and gain additional insight, removing the language barrier through virtual translation tools can be a cost-effective method of streamlining the conversation.
As a result, KOLs in regional and local areas can engage in conversation on their terms, helping navigate patient models and any potential problems with ease.
For pharma, this newfound ease opens doors for global collaboration that were closed before. Being able to share lifesaving treatments with all patients will put pharma’s best foot forward in the public light.
Driving efficiency in the supply chain
In the last 18 months, one of the biggest problems facing the global pharmaceutical industry was the supply chain shortages. Companies knew the existing supply chain was fragile already, with supply chain shocks predicted to cost med tech companies 3.8% of earnings. But the public looks for a smooth-sailing ship. Any future shortages can have a negative impact, so it’s up to pharma to make sure this doesn’t happen.
Med tech companies should be challenging themselves to be part of a more resilient, durable supply chain. As well as more crisis planning, higher inventory levels and short-term demand forecasts, companies should look to streamline the process outside of these traditional bottlenecks and look into how they’re helping engage the supply chain of other companies.
For medical device companies, this can be identifying and maintaining engagement with critical stakeholders throughout the supply chain. Whether it be CRO teams, patient support groups or KOLs in a target market, ensuring smooth and seamless communication is essential.
Medical device companies can use technology to ease pain points around engagement to increase efficiency in the supply chain. Over-time meetings and easy access can make meetings, consultations and advisory boards more manageable against a busy backdrop. As a result, potential delays can be minimised.
Patients expect treatments to become readily available, and affordable. In an industry where a two-week delay at one point can lead to a two-month delay at another, stakeholders across the full supply chain are engaged in the most efficient way possible.
Compliance of data
In an era of big data, cyber-attacks, data leaks and patient protection couldn’t be more important for pharma companies. Through clinical trials, patients give an increasing amount of their personal data to companies with expected protection. Breaks in this trust damage pharma’s reputation.
In some instances, life science companies are reluctant to prioritise direct patient engagement because of extensive data compliance practices.
Engaging these patients on a virtual platform with in-built compliance guardrails can not only save the HCPs time, energy and potential embarrassment, but it can provide the patient with an added sense of ease and security.
On platforms like Within3, the ability to answer private questions, maintain an audit trail and blind or double-blind interactions can protect both patients and life science companies from any negative consequences.
Maintaining a positive image of pharma isn’t easy, and the solution isn’t through quick fixes. Instead, ingrained, sustained and lasting changes to how the industry operates are needed to capitalise on the finite pandemic approval bounce. For a lot of these solutions, med tech platforms aren’t the panacea, but they’re the primary tool in making change.
By Phillip J. Meister, Vice President, Business Development – EU | APAC