The shared goal of both life science companies and healthcare consumers is improved patient outcomes. However, this may be hard to achieve when patients struggle to navigate the complexities of the healthcare system. For patients living with a disease, the journey can feel acutely alienating. From accessing providers, to obtaining prior-authorizations and utilizing therapies, patients are often dragged along as they attempt to control their health.
As healthcare spending continues its steady trajectory upward, and the cost-sharing burden falls to patients, manufacturers must demonstrate value.
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So how can pharmaceutical companies create a valuable experience for their patients? By incorporating innovative hub solutions that allow them to connect directly with their patients and guide them through their healthcare journey.
‘A center of activity’ is one of the ways the word ‘hub’ is traditionally defined and succinctly sums up its purpose in life sciences. Hubs have been used by pharmaceutical companies to manage their patient’s journeys once therapy has been prescribed. Hub services can encompass benefits verification, prior-authorization retrieval, financial assistance, nursing services, and prescription fulfillment.
Technology now enables centralized and integrated hubs that can act as a single point of contact for patients suffering illness and the companies providing therapies. In our ever-changing healthcare landscape, a centralized hub can be an invaluable resource to deliver high-touch care. By providing guidance, as well as comprehensive services and programs, hubs quickly guide patients to therapy.
Confronting the challenges of the patient journey
The patient journey can be arduous. What begins with symptoms or test results can become a frustrating trek towards a diagnosis. It takes patients with rare diseases an average of 7 years to be diagnosed from the onset of symptoms. Following the prognosis of a disease — rare or otherwise — and before therapy can be initiated, it must be prescribed, benefits must be verified, authorizations must be approved, financial assistance may be required, or formularies may be challenged for dispensation.
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From a prolonged diagnosis, contention with insurance, costly treatments, and the major shift of lifelong habits, every station along the patient’s journey can impact the probability of initiation and adherence to therapy.
Can hub be a beacon for patients?
According to Accenture’s 2016 patient support services survey results, “Pharma’s Growing Opportunity in Patient Services”, 95 percent of pharmaceutical companies will invest in patient engagement technologies by 2018. Patient services will become the standard of therapeutic customer support, not a niche add-on.
Why? Because when therapeutic companies support their patients to understand and better manage their disease states, they gain the ability to deliver better outcomes. When patients successfully engage with therapeutic support, it can result in improved therapy adherence, build loyalty, and amass patient data.
Patient engagement technologies can provide a reliable hub for therapy providers and consumers to engage and really make an impact. Using a patient services platform, health consumers can receive steadfast support from agents of the manufacturer who, equipped with insights and data, can offer personalized and patient-centered care. The journey to therapy may have been frustrating and clouded with complications, but patient support services can be a beacon.
The continuous relationship between patients and therapy can begin even before a prescription has been approved, allowing companies to accumulate patient data. Successful onboarding builds trust, so attention can then be turned to optimizing adherence, mitigating adverse effects, and monitoring outcomes. This is especially true for patients with rare disease. Comprising such a small segment of the population, it is critical for these patients to adhere to therapies for the benefit of their own disease management. This naturally boosts the commercial success of the therapy.
Supporting patients is mutually beneficial, driving positive outcomes for all stakeholders and augmenting value for all parties involved. When therapeutics shepherd patients through hub services with high-touch care, they enjoy mutually assured success.
Customer connections matter
Today’s healthcare industry is value-driven and outcomes-based—a company and its therapy will only be as successful as the patient and care teams it is working with. Beginning and ending a patient interaction once therapy is dispensed will no longer cut it. Market forces are pushing therapies to embrace and incorporate patient engagement technologies for more relevant products and transparent data, which in turn opens the door for high-touch patient services—driving positive outcomes and demonstrating value.
Manufacturers have an opportunity to provide their consumers with the much-needed support of a patient-focused team managing their access to therapy. Those who can offer an end-to-end service throughout the patient’s journey will win and retain customers, and deliver consistent positive experiences resulting in speed to therapy, and improved health outcomes.
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